Two Is Better Than One
by DarkElements10
Summary: For Mudmaster94. Katie Knight, 19, college student, waitress. What happens when she runs into her old friends who she hasn't seen in a long time? Will her relationship with them change? Add in a ex-boyfriend and things will get crazy. Logan/Katie/James
1. Prologue

_**Prologue**_

"Hey Katie, wake up, it's time to go."

Katie Knight groaned as she pulled her blankets over her head, snuggling deeper into her covers. She sighed and smiled serenely as she started to drift off again. But that moment was ruined when her covers were completely thrown off of her. She shivered and blindly reached for them and finally opened her eyes when she didn't feel her blankets on her bed.

"Sarah!" she shouted at her roommate, who was standing at the foot of her bed, smirking at her and holding onto her blankets. "Give me back my sheets, I'm cold!"

"We're going to be late for work," Sarah replied with a bemused smile. "And you know that you'll get fired if you're late again."

"You know that whenever Kendall calls I can't miss it." Katie replied as she slid out of her bed and went over to her closet to get some clothes. "I haven't seen him in a while because he's so busy with his hockey career."

"He's been so successful," Sarah commented as she sat down on her bed to wait for her roommate. "I mean, starting out with the famous boy band Big Time Rush, and then going on to live his dream as a Hockey Star? He's totally living the dream."

"I know," Katie smiled with pride, but it didn't last long. "Unfortunately that means that he's always conditioning and playing games and stuff, so I don't get to see him as much as I used to." She looked at her calendar. "But he should be back in LA this weekend." She quickly pulled on her clothes and grabbed her purse. "Let's go."

Things had changed ever since Big Time Rush had gotten big when Katie's brother was sixteen and she was thirteen. Six years had gone by and as usual, the boy band craze had died down. With that, was the end of Big Time Rush. Kendall and Carlos moved on to play for the Minnesota Wild, Logan is studying to become a doctor, and James is a famous actor being in many films. Even though their band was split up, their friendship had gotten even stronger as they had constantly called each other and met up to talk about how they're doing and to just hang out.

When the band broke up, Katie and Mrs. Knight moved from the Palm Woods to a house that Kendall bought for them with the money from Big Time Rush. Then Katie kept up with her studies to go off to college. Now she goes to UCLA and is studying to become a lawyer, something that Kendall always said that she should do because she was good at making people feel guilty and intimidation.

She and Sarah work at the Silver Spring restaurant in central Los Angeles. It specializes in Italian food, but you can usually find people getting American and Mexican food as well there. Katie didn't really like the idea of working as a waitress, but she refused to live off of Kendall's money for the rest of her life, and she was still getting some acting jobs, so she was making some money for herself.

If she knew what going to work that day would bring, she might have thought twice about going.

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**A/N: Just so the age gap wouldn't be so big, I made it that Katie is only three years younger than the guys. I haven't written a story like this before but I hope you guys like it. This is a request for Mudmaster24.**

**-Riley**


	2. James

**James**

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**Unfortunately, as I breezed in the door, there Charlie was taking a couple of elderly men's orders. She managed to grin cheekily at me. I've known Charlotte Hayes, or Charlie, for about a year - we met at work, actually, because she's a couple of years older than me and Sarah. "You're almost late today!" she sung as Sarah and I walked past her. "It's was so close!"

"Cut me some slack, Charlie!" I laughed, opening the door to the back of the diner.

Quickly I moved around the back of the restaurant, getting my things together. I tied my apron on, slipped a notepad and pen into the front pocket, and then stepped back out into the diner, taking a moment to say hello to the other waiter, Jacob, and to look around the restaurant.

A lot of people would be complaining about working as a waiter or a waitress, but I love it. Silver Spring is a pretty small by restaurant standards - it has black and white floor tiles, four booths against the front window covered in red vinyl and dark brown tables and chairs in the rest of the restaurant. There's a sort of "soda counter" at the back of the restaurant near the door to the counter with tall chrome stools.

Don't ask me if it was supposed to be an Italian restaurant why it looks like that. It just does.

"Hullo!" I chirped approaching one of the small, two person tables that neither Jacob, Sarah, nor Charlie had attended to.

Charlie caught up with me a little while later, lounging in the back waiting for meals to be ready. There was a pane-less window beside the kitchen door that we could see out of, and since neither of our customers was falling over themselves for assistance, we were free to chat.

"Are you excited for tomorrow?" Charlie asked. I grinned.

Saturday night, Charlie was taking Sarah and me to a club so we could watch some of the new upcoming bands from our area. We weren't twenty-one, so Charlie was getting fake IDs for us. Of course my mom would freak out if she knew that that's where we were going, after I told her that I could only go back to visit her on Sunday instead of our normal weekend routine. That's why I had to get Kendall to promise to come back on Saturday, so mom wouldn't be too lonely.

She hasn't had a boyfriend in a while.

"Definitely," I replied enthusiastically. "Although I think I should drive this time. You are a pretty angry drunk."

Charlie waved me away. "Can you blame me? There you were lecturing me on driving while intoxicated and all I wanted to do was get home so I could down a bottle of Aspirin and sleep for sixteen hours."

"Charlie, don't talk about stuff like that in public places." I reprimanded her as Ian walked by, laughing.

"Hey Kates, I think one of yours needs something." Jacob jerked his thumb up to the front of the restaurant as he went by. Jacob was around the same age as Charlie, with spiky blue hair and brown eyes.

So this is how it goes at Silver Spring, early morning until right before lunch is the drag time. There are usually no customers, and when there are, they don't come in crowds. Mostly the only thing to do is drag your feet and clean. The lunch rush is better, because it keeps you busy and on your feet, so you don't have time to watch the clock. It settles down around two, and then picks up just after five.

The diner door swung open with the clanging of a bell and a tall boy walked into the restaurant and plopped himself into a booth, pulling out his phone and starting to text. I continued with what I was doing until Jacob walked by again.

"Kates, it your table." He stated as he balanced a bin of dirty dishes against his hip. I followed his gaze and realized that he was right. "You don't think that you could just slack off do you? Even if you _were almost _late…_again_!"

"Shut up, Jacob" I replied with a laugh as I gathered everything that I needed to wait on the person. I went over to the person and turned to get his attention. He looked up and smiled at me, as if he had known me before. That was sort of confusing, but I knew that I had seen that face…

"Uh, are you ok?" he waved a hand in my face.

"Sorry!" I said quickly, handing him a menu. "I guess I zoned out."

"No problem, Katie." the boy grinned. How did he know my name? Narrowing my eyes, it took me a second to remember where I had seen that grin before, and then I burst out into laughter as James stood up and gave me a big hug, rocking me back and forth. "How are you, kid?"

"I'm great," I replied enthusiastically. "Just going through school and blah, blah, blah, what about you?" I lightly hit his arm. "How's the acting going? Last I heard from Kendall, you had to go to Canada for some filming."

"Yeah, I got a part in a movie." James replied and his smile grew. "Along with Dak Zevon." My smiled waned a little bit and James noticed, looking horrified. "I'm sorry Katie; I didn't mean to bring it up."

"That's all right." I replied as I brushed some hair behind my ear. I had dated Dak for a while, but with any other movie star that I have read about; he dumped me for the next best thing. Kendall of course, was completely pissed, and it took me a long time to get him to calm down. And I thought I was over it, but now I'm not sure. "It's the past." I tried to sound upbeat again. "Are you still going to be around this weekend?"

"Yeah," James nodded as he ran his fingers through his hair. "I'm off for a while, and trust me, I needed it. Next Thursday I'm going back to Minnesota to visit my family before I have to leave again." He added.

"Great, Kendall and Carlos are going to be in town tomorrow," I explained. "I know that they will be really excited to see you."

"What about Logan?" James questioned curiously.

"He's been so busy with doctor stuff I haven't seen much of him lately," I replied with a wave of my hand. "You know how he can be. He's living his dream. But I'll try to get him to come by."

"Is he still dating Camille?" I hesitated. "That's alright; you don't have to tell me." James laughed in reply. "So, what do you recommend around here?" he asked as he tapped the menu that was in front of him.

"The Tetrazzini" I replied with a smile at the thought. "You can get it in chicken or beef, although I would suggest the chicken."

"The Chicken Tetrazzini it is then," James replied as he handed the menu back as I scribbled down the order. "And I'd like green tea to drink."

"Still trying to keep the acne away, huh?" I teased before walking to the back of the diner to put in the other. I continued to wait tables as it got busier and busier, so I wasn't able to talk to James as much as I used to.

"See you later, Katie." James called with a wave as he left the restaurant. I smiled and waved back as I stacked dirty dishes and silverware into a bin and started to walk it to the back of the restaurant, where Jacob and Charlie were waiting for me.

"Who was that?" Charlie asked with a coy smile as soon as I reached back there.

"My friend James." I replied as I started to unpack the bin. "I haven't seen him in a while."

"He's good looking," Jacob commented. Now before you ask, he isn't gay or bi. He's completely straight. But he always has to speak up whenever he thinks that someone is good looking, a guy or a girl. He tries to set us up, and by us I mean me, Charlie, and Sarah, on dates all the time. And usually they're good matches. "Have you two ever gone out? Because you seemed to be really close."

"Ew!" I made a face as I tossed a dishtowel at him. "No! James is one of my older brother's best friends." I shook my head. "It's never going to happen."

"Just wondering."

I could tell him one thing though; I hadn't been more excited for the weekend in such a long time.

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**A/N: So here's the first chapter. I hope you guys liked it; most of the story is going to be in Katie's POV. BTW I have NOTHING against gays, bis, or lesbians.**

**-Riley  
**


	3. Right Here, Right Now

**Right Here, Right Now**

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**I don't really remember what I did the next day, I was just excited to know that James and Kendall and Carlos were all going to be home this weekend. It was always fun to have the guys over to hang out. Plus, since Charlie was taking me to a nightclub tonight, I had time to hang out with the guys before I left. And that's exactly where I am, at home, with mom, waiting for Kendall and Carlos and James.

Well, mom was waiting; I was constantly checking the windows at the front of the house with my usual bout of impatience. I continued to move back and forth from the couch to the windows, jumping at any sound of a car door slamming shut. I would practically dive over the couch each and every time; I managed to scrape my knees a few times, and was always disappointed when it wasn't them.

Finally, after an hour of endless waiting I heard the sound that I had been dreaming about.

The sound of the front door opening, my brother's laughter, a bag dropping on the ground, a hockey stick clattering along behind it, and Kendall's shout of 'I'm Home!'

"Kendall!" Unable to hold my excitement, I quickly jumped up and raced to the doorway, throwing myself into Kendall's chest, wrapping my arms around his waist. "Kendall, you're finally home!" I pushed my face into his chest and breathed in the scent that is my brother; Old Spice and soap.

"Hey little sis," Kendall laughed and I felt a kiss land on the top of my head before his arms encircled me, hugging me tightly. "How've you been?"

"Great," I pulled back and looked up at him before turning to Carlos, who was standing there, pouting at me and Kendall, making whimpering noises. I sighed and rolled my eyes. "Hey Carlos," I gave him a hug too and he immediately burst into a grin. Always the sensitive one. "C'mon, you have to tell me and mom everything!"

I grabbed Kendall's hand and led him to the living room, where he hugged and kissed mom before sitting down next to her on the couch. Carlos immediately went over to the kitchen and got something to eat before coming back out and listening to Kendall as he told stories about what was happening while they were training for a big game coming up soon.

I couldn't help but smile as Kendall and Carlos talked excitedly about everything that was going on. Waking up early, to practice, to weight training, to lunch, to more practices, to dinner, more weight training, and then going to sleep. They even told the story of where they played a prank on one of their teammates by secretly slipping tobacco sauce into his soda while they were out at a Japanese restaurant for dinner. It just made me miss all of the times where we were in the Palm Woods and we played pranks on Bitters.

"So how long are you guys going to be in town this time?" I asked as I leaned back on the couch and looked at my watch, checking to see how much time I had left before I had to get ready.

"We're going to be here for about four days," Kendall replied as he looked thoughtful. "The training camp is over, so we have a few days to spend at home, so here we are."

"Why didn't you want to go back to Minnesota to see your family?" Mom asked as she turned to Carlos, who was still eating a large sandwich that he had made. Carlos held up a finger, letting mom know that he would start talking after he finished chewing.

Thank god.

I've seen Carlos talk with his mouthful, and I've seen food fly everywhere. Trust me; it's not a pretty sight.

"Well, I thought about going back home," Carlos replied as he stood up and brushed crumbs off of his shirt and onto the plate that he was holding. Mom and I weren't fazed, as Carlos did that every time that he came over and ate something. He was like my brother, another son to my mom, so she didn't really mind to pick up after him. "But when I figured out that one of our first games is a home game, they were happy to wait. Plus," he grinned. "I get to sample your great cooking."

"I thought that my food had something to do with it." Mom replied with a pleased smile. She liked to baby us, even though I was 19 and Kendall and Carlos were 22. She smiled and reached over, brushing Kendall's hair off of his forehead fondly. "I'm just glad that you're home sweetie." She smiled as she cupped his cheek.

I smiled over at Kendall and he blushed as he looked back at me.

Told Ya.

"Well," Kendall stood up and stretched a little bit, yawning loudly and fakely. "I'm a little tired, so I'm just going to _get my bag_ and _go upstairs_ to _my room_ and unpack some stuff before _going to sleep_." Kendall put emphasis on a few words as he kept shooting me glances. I rolled my eyes and shook my head at Kendall's really bad acting.

I knew that he wanted to use that time to make a plan for me to distract mom to go to the nightclub, as well as giving me rule after rule after rule of what I should do in dangerous situations and stuff. Even though he wasn't around as much as usual, he could still be really protective from a distance.

"I'm going to help him, mom." I stated as I followed him up the stairs and to his bedroom, closing the door behind me. Through the door, I could hear Carlos already bugging mom about what they were going to have for dinner, even though he had just eaten a big sandwich. Then there was a loud crashing sound, but neither Kendall nor I flinched, as Carlos was still wearing his helmet and because we were used to it happening. "So, what's the plan big bro?" I asked as I crossed my arms over my chest, watching as he started to throw some of his clothe around his room.

"The plan is that you're not going to drink or do drugs." Kendall replied as he turned to look at me, seriously. I rolled my eyes (again) and scoffed, having heard it a million times.

"I know, Kendall, I'm not stupid." I stated as I moved by him and sat down on his bed. "You know me, I'm the one that's too smart to do any drugs or drink because I've seen what it does to people." I smiled faintly at the memory of Charlotte's potty mouth whenever she gets drunk. "Are you forgetting that when I was thirteen, instead of kissing boys I was hustling people for money?"

"Trust me, I remember," Kendall replied and reached out a hand, purposely messing up my hair. I made a sound of protest and shoved him away as he laughed. "I know that you know not to do anything like that, and you're one of the toughest girls that I've ever met."

"You mean besides Jo?" I asked, mentioning his girlfriend, who knew judo.

From the smile on his face I could tell that he was completely in love with her. They had started dating when they were sixteen and have been together ever since. Don't get me wrong, they have their fights like any other couple, but we always know that they're going to be together forever. Plus, I think he's going to propose soon.

"Yes, besides Jo." Kendall replied and then turned serious again. "So that means that you can handle yourself if a guy gets too close. Other than the usual, just call me if something goes wrong." He snapped and then looked at me again. "Better yet, call me when you get there, and then an hour later, and then when you leave. If I don't hear from you those three times, then I'm going to assume that something went wrong and I'm going to go down there and pick your ass up."

And there he goes. One minute he can be the cool older brother that will help me get away with something that will give my mom a heart attack, and the next minute he could act like he was my dad or something. I pretended to hate it, but it just showed me that he cared about my well being and I loved that about him.

"Got it." I replied giving thumbs up. I smiled and let out a giggle as Kendall yawned loudly and flopped down onto his bed, nodding off. I grabbed his shoes and slid them off his feet, making a face at the smell, before I grabbed his blankets and pulled it up his body. "Sleep tight, big bro."

Kendall muttered something in his sleep before snoring loudly, and I knew that he was completely gone. Laughing to myself, I left his room, closing the door gently behind me, before heading back down the stairs. I could hear Carlos and my mom talking over the sounds of pots and pans clanging together and I immediately knew that Carlos was cooking something for dinner. I started to go over to the kitchen, but the sound of the doorbell ringing caught my attention. I walked over to the door and pulled it open to see James standing on the doorway, his hands in his pockets.

I had forgotten how much taller he was than me, I mean; I had to crane my neck back just to smile up at him. It was odd; I hadn't noticed how nice his smile was before. His teeth were so white it was like, borderline blue, which set off his hazel eyes that I could now see easily as he had cut his hair.

"Are you going to stand there or let me in?" James asked as he raised an eyebrow in amusement. I smirked back in reply as I leaned against the doorframe.

"I don't know," I pretended to think about it. "Because you usually just barged in whenever you wanted, what changed that?"

"The fact that the last time that I barged in, it was when your mom had fallen asleep on the couch," James absentmindedly moved his hand across his forehead, to brush his hair out of his face like he used to do with long hair. His hand reached thin air and he chuckled a bit before pulling his hand back down. "And almost giving her a heart attack."

"Meh," I shrugged carelessly. "It's not like with everything that we've done before that we haven't given mom a heart attack." I stood back and allowed him to walk in the house. "Carlos is in the kitchen, and Kendall is upstairs, asleep."

James' grin grew bigger and he turned and bolted towards the kitchen, screaming Carlos' name as he went. I laughed hysterically as I heard Carlos's shout of James's name and then the two of them talking excitedly and in high-pitches voices before they hurried back out of the kitchen,.

"What are you doing?" I asked as I followed them towards the stairs. I knew that they were going to do something to Kendall from their frantic giggles and shushing of one another.

"We're going to wake up Kendall." Carlos replied and started to laugh again, but James placed a hand over his mouth and dragged him up the stairs that way. I moved ahead and opened Kendall's bedroom door quietly, just give James and Carlos the time to run and jump onto Kendall's bed, which is what they did.

"WHAT THE HELL?" Kendall shouted as he felt their weights land on top of him.

"KENDALL!" James screamed in his face. "HOW ARE YOU DUDE!"

"Ugh, don't yell in my face, James." Kendall groaned as he dragged his blanket back over his head. A second later, he popped back out and stared at his friend, before breaking out into a grin and tackling his friends off the bed and onto the floor.

"You're welcome." I called as I stepped over their bodies to get out of the room without getting hurt.

"What are we saying thank you for?" Kendall asked as he took Carlos's helmet and was taunting his friend as he held it out of his reach. They were acting like they were 16 again, the same way they always acted when they were together.

"If I didn't let James in, then you wouldn't be happy." I replied as I grabbed onto the door knob and started to leave the room.

"Thanks Katie!" I heard the three of them shout behind me as I left to get ready to go to the club.

I grabbed my clothes from my room and raced to the bathroom to take a quick shower and to put some makeup on. After getting dressed, I stepped back from the mirror to brush my hair and to look over at the outfit that I had decided on. I was wearing a shrunken white blazer over a purple tank-top with a black skirt, black leggings, and black high-heels. For my makeup, I decided to keep it simple with shiny lip-gloss, black eyeliner, mascara, and bronze eyeliner.

When I was finished dressing, I didn't have a lot of time to get down the stairs and out the front door before mom could catch me and demand where I'm going. I inched my way down the stairs and peered around the corner to see Kendall, Carlos, James, and Mom in the living room watching wheel of fortune. I caught Kendall's eye and waved a little, making a panicked face, knowing that if I made a run for it, mom would catch me. Kendall winked back before looking thoughtful.

"Mom, you know what we haven't seen in a while?" he asked as he looked at the ceiling and then smiled innocently. "My baby book."

"Oh, you're right!" Mom smiled that overly-sappy smile that's usually reserved for our first day of school, and moved to go get it. Kendall turned back and gave another wink and I waved and blew a kiss before hurrying out the front door.

Charlie was already sitting in the driveway in her dad's truck, Sarah sitting in shotgun. I quickly hurried over and pulled open the door and clambered into the backseat as Charlie reversed and quickly sped away. Charlie and Sarah both knew that my mom didn't know that I went to clubs where I was underage. But it was all in fun and it was the only way that I would be able to hear the local bands.

"So, are you ready to have fun?" Charlie asked as she turned the wheel to turn onto another street. Sarah and I cheered our excitement, my worries about mom and everything else fading away.

I was ready to have fun.

* * *

"Smile; Imma, get you...look, shine an' stinker," Charlie pronounced triumphantly, poking an index finger into my cheek once she got close enough, and then frowned as her slurred words registered. "Sink, line, and uh…hooker!" I coughed and waved a hand in front of my face as her breath hit my nose.

"You're drunk," I stated, eyebrows raised in incredulity as Sarah and I held onto her arms, making sure that she didn't' fall over.

"No'm not!" her glassy eyes narrowed. "You…you…shine, linky-hooker!"—a shaking finger directed at his nose.

"Did you just call me a hooker?" I asked in amusement, causing Sarah to burst out laughing. I started to laugh to, but my laughter turned into a loud gasp of horror as Charlie seemed to melt like Gumby and fall out of my grasp, landing heavily on the ground. "Charlie? Oh my god, Charlie are you ok?"

Sarah and I knelt down beside her and looked at her face. She was lying on her back and her eyes were closed. I started to shake her and her head started to roll back and forth. This hadn't happened before; usually she was able to hold her liquor pretty easily.

"What's wrong?" a voice shouted over the pounding music. I looked up to see a guy about my brother's age, rolling up his sleeves and kneeling down with us. "How much did she drink tonight?"

"I don't know," I replied with a shake of my head, brushing my hair behind my ears. I looked over at Sarah and she looked really scared. The expression on her face most likely matched mine. "I wasn't watching her all night."

"Is she going to be ok?" Sarah asked anxiously. The guy moved his hand under her nose and smiled a little.

"She's going to be fine, she just passed out." He replied and gently rolled her onto her side. "I don't want to leave her on her back, in case she throws up, we don't want her to choke." He finally looked up and I immediately recognized him.

"Logan?"

"Hey Katie."

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**A/N: Here's a longer chapter for you guys. I hope you're enjoying it, because I'm having a _great_ time writing about Katie. It's a really cool angle to do. I might make a series all from her point of view. Anyway, read and review, constructive criticism is welcome.**


	4. Logan

**Logan**

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As soon as Logan put together me being at a nightclub where I shouldn't have been allowed to be, his happiness faded quickly.

"Katie?" he looked shocked. "What are you doing here? You're definitely not twenty one." He looked concerned as he looked around the room. "You haven't been drinking have you? Does Kendall know you're here? Does-"

"Logan, shut up" I commanded as I rolled my eyes. "I'm here because Charlie over here," I motioned over to my friend who was lying on the ground. "Got us fake IDs so we could see some of the local bands that are famous around here." I turned my eyes to him and cocked n eyebrow. "Not that you would know because you're working all the time." I then cleared my throat and continued. "I'm not stupid enough to drink, which you should know, and Kendall _does_ know I'm here." I planted my hands on my hips. "I think I've answered all of your questions, is there anything else that you'd like to know?"

"No, but you're going home." Logan replied as he grabbed my arm, his other hand digging around for his keys in his pockets. "And your friends are coming with us."

"I think that's a good idea," Sarah agreed as she nodded in agreement. I sighed, knowing that she was scared over what happened. But I was a little bit annoyed that I wasn't able to see Toxic Blood tonight.

"Fine," I replied with a heavy sigh, noticing that Logan was staring at me intently. "What?" I snapped, annoyed that he had to ruin my fun by being such a kill joy.

"Nothing." He replied simply and helped Charlie to her feet, her head lolling back and forth as she started to wake up. "You're ok," Logan said to her as she started to mumble groggily. "We're going to take you home so you can get some rest, alright."

"Alright." Charlie muttered in reply and dropped her head on his shoulder as Logan started to lead the way out of the nightclub. I grabbed our bags from the check-in and hurried after them, mentally fuming. I don't know why I was so annoyed.

It was probably the fact that it was someone that I had known for a long time and that had a tendency to worry over nothing that was bothering me. Yeah, that was it. I mean, this guy did practically everything wrong when he listened to Kendall back when we were living at the Palm Woods, and now here he was, being a worry wart all over again.

We got into his car, which I was slightly surprised at how nice it was, and he drove Charlie and Sarah home before driving over to mine.

"Alright, so what did I do to get you so mad at me?" Logan asked as he pulled out of Sarah's driveway and started the drive back home. I sunk low in my seat and rested my feet on the dashboard. "Feet down, please, it's not safe."

"_That's_ what you did!" I replied as I sat up straight and moved my feet back down to the floor. "You went ahead and acted like you were Kendall, or my dad or something. Do you know how embarrassing it is to have to be treated like a kid in a place like that?"

"You _are_ a kid." Logan replied gently.

"No, I'm an adult, you only see me as a kid." I replied and brushed my long hair away from my face. "You're not my father!"

"Neither is Kendall." Logan replied passively. I didn't know what that had to do with anything, but I was too annoyed to care.

"Of course he isn't, he's my _brother_!" I replied. "And _he_ has the right to do this, not you!"

"So you're saying I'm not your brother?" Logan sounded a little hurt and I felt bad. Of course he was my brother, he was going to be my brother when my real brother couldn't be there.

"That's not the point!" I snapped, losing patience of trying to explain to him what was going on. "You shouldn't have-"

"Considering the fact that you're two years younger than the age that would let you into the club, I'm sure that Mama Knight would also like to hear that one of your friends got drunk." Logan cut into the conversation, slowing the car down as we reached a red light. He rolled down the windows and I felt the cool air from outside hitting my face. "Besides, I'm sure that guy that was staring at you all night wouldn't have cared how old you were, to do what he wanted." He shuddered a little bit, looking uncomfortable. "And there's no way that I was going to let _that_ happen."

"Yeah, well," I crossed my arms over my chest, feeling like I had just been caught red handed with my hand in the cookie jar. "I can take care of myself." I felt my anger rise again. "And you haven't been around long enough to deserve to do anything like this."

"Well, excuse me for thinking that we're still friends," Logan replied with a shrug and reached out and grabbed onto the stick shift as the car moved forwards again. I smiled at the sound of the engine revving. "Besides, when you're training to be a doctor you get really busy and then you don't have a lot of time for the things that you want to do." He sighed wistfully. "Like being able to see your best friends."

"Or your girlfriend?" I added after a second of silence.

"How'd you know?" Logan asked eyes on the road and hands at ten and two. If his voice hadn't cracked a little bit, I wouldn't have known that it was bothering him.

"I guessed," I replied and brushed my hair back behind my ears. "She hasn't come around the restaurant as much and when I asked Jo about it, she said it was because she was busy with auditions and stuff. By my thought was that you guys could have broken up."

"Do the guys know?" Logan asked as he rubbed his chin, lightly turning the wheel as he turned onto my street.

"I doubt they've noticed." I replied honestly. "I mean, Kendall and Carlos have been so busy with hockey and James with all of his movies." I paused. "I don't mean that in a bad way, like they don't care of anything."

"I know what you mean, Katie. Don't worry." Logan chuckled as he pulled up into the driveway and cut off the car. "You don't have to worry about your mom either, I won't tell her what happened." He turned and winked at me. "It'll be our little secret."

"Got it." I replied with a smile and got out of the car. I checked to make sure I had my key before slinging my purse over my shoulder and click-clacked my way up the sidewalk and to the front door. I pushed the key into the lock and walked inside, tossing my purse to the ground by the door. "I'm home!" I called as Logan slipped inside and I closed the door behind me. "And I brought someone with me!"

"What?" Kendall's voice came from the kitchen and I waited as I could hear his footsteps coming from the kitchen and towards the foyer. That must meant that Kendall and mom had finally stopped looking at baby pictures and mom was up in her room reminiscing. "Katie Knight, if it's not one thing it's another!" He was going all 'parent/big brother mode' on me. I rolled my eyes as his footsteps got closer. "How could you be as _stupid_ as to-"He turned the corner, stopped, and stared when he saw who I was with.

"Stupid as to do…what?" I questioned as I cupped my hand around my ear. Kendall shot me a dirty look before grinning and moving towards Logan, gathering him in a hug.

"Logie! It's so great to see you, dude!" he cried, slapping his friend on the back happily. "It's been so long."

"I know," Logan brushed his hair off of his forehead. "I've been so busy."

"I'll bet." Kendall grinned and let go of his friend, turning towards the living room. "Guys! James! Carlos! Come see who's here! It's Logie!" I almost burst out laughing. My brother was acting as if he was on a sugar high.

There was the sound of frantic footsteps and I moved over to the stairs quick enough so that I wasn't pummeled by James and Carlos, who had rushed over as soon as they had heard what Kendall was saying. Soon the four boys were talking and shouting so loud that it wouldn't surprise me if mom could hear them from all the way in her room.

"Dude, why haven't you called or anything?" Carlos demanded as he slapped his friend on the arm. "I mean, we've all sent you messages and everything." He pouted, causing Logan to laugh.

"I've been so busy guys, I'm sorry." He apologized quickly.

"Wait a minute," James looked confused for a second. "Katie brought you home, after she went to a nightclub." He gestured over to me and then turned back to Logan. "Did she meet you there?" he grinned. "And you said that you were never, _ever_, going to nightclubs." He jostled his friend. "What changed your mind?"

"I don't know," Logan looked mystified for a second as he rubbed his chin. "I wasn't planning on it at first. Not at all, actually." He admitted. "But something kept telling me that I had to go, and it was getting pretty annoying so I went along with it." He explained and then looked over towards me. "But I guess that it was a good thing that I did."

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**A/N: Wow, 11 reviews for the last chapter. Thanks guys, it really made me smile. I'm glad you like it so much. The next chapter will be up soon.**

**-Riley**


	5. Not The Same

**Not The Same**

"So Katie, how's UCLA been treating you?" Logan asked as he peered over his hand of cards.

I smiled a little, but then let my face fall back into a mask of apathy. It was Sunday afternoon, it was raining, and we were very bored. Last night after the guys had caught up, Kendall demanded that James and Logan come over again the next day, as Carlos was staying at our house like he usually did when they came and visited, and of course they weren't going to pass on that. Unfortunately, it seemed that they brought the storm with them as it had been storming for the past hour and didn't seem that it would be letting up soon. We were so bored that we decided to play Poker and I could tell from the way that Logan asked me the question that he knew that he was going to lose, but didn't want to admit it.

"UCLA is like any other college," I replied as I looked over my hand, tapping my chin as I tried to decide whether or not I wanted to change my hand. "There are friends, teachers, classes, homework, and drama." I smiled a little. "And _lots_ of parties."

"So you don't have a boyfriend?" James asked curiously as he shoved a hand into Carlo's lap, where a bowl of chips were resting. Carlos let out a growling sound and moved the bowl away, even though James had managed to grab a few chips.

"She better not." Kendall grunted from my other side.

I laughed a little bit as I decided to keep my hand and moved my cards to my lap to grab some chips too. Ever since the failed relationship with Dak, let's just say that Kendall has gotten even more overprotective than usual, so it explained why he was freaking out whenever I mentioned a guy even if he was just a friend.

"I don't," I replied and leaned back as I pushed a few chips into my mouth, chewing quickly. "And I haven't looked for one, I've been too busy."

"That's good," Carlos commented. "You don't need a man to make you happy anyway," he sniffed indignantly and Kendall laughed and slapped him on the shoulder, agreeing with him.

"Whatever," I replied and rolled my eyes. "Let's keep playing." I looked at my cards again. "One please." I smiled sweetly as Logan picked up a card from the deck and held it out to me as I discarded my other one. At this moment I had an ace, a king, a queen, a jack, and a five. All I needed was a ten, which was why I had discarded my first card. I took the card that Logan handed to me and I did my best to look disappointed. "Damn." I muttered, catching Logan's smirk.

I knew that he was the only one that I had to worry about. Kendall, James, and Carlos were good, but they weren't as good as Logan. Logan was the kind of guy that made you wait ten minutes before he made a move in any game he played, just because he was thinking of a way that would cause him to get into our minds and to make us fold.

It had happened before.

"It's your bet, Kates." Logan said, moving his cards around. I noticed that Kendall, James, and Carlos were out and that it was Logan and me left.

Typical.

I looked at my chips, contemplating, then picked up a five and tossed it in the middle. He called my bet and laid down his cards.

A full house.

I bit my lip and slowly set my cards down. By the time they touched the table I was smirking.

A royal flush.

Logan blinked and looked up at me, eyes wide with shock and his mouth dropped open so far that it almost hit the ground. That image made me giggled as I greedily reached forward and took the pot of chips.

"But, you had nothing. I could see it in your face!" Logan screeched, pointing to my cards.

"After all of these years you think I haven't learned to trick you guys?" I asked, smirking as I turned to Kendall. "Some of this is yours, just because you've done so much for me over the years."

"Thanks baby sis." Kendall replied and placed his hand on top of my head before moving it around quickly, moving my hair out of place. He knew that I hated when he did that.

"No, no, no, no, no, no, no." Logan repeated as he dove forwards and grabbed onto my playing cards. I threw my hands into the air and cheered loudly, just trying to get under his skin, like usual. "That's impossible!" he looked up at me. "You cheated! I know you did!"

"I did not cheat!" I replied indignantly.

"Yes you did," Logan slowly nodded, a strange look on his face. I raised an eyebrow as he leaned over and grabbed onto the pillow that he was sitting on and held it over his head, before leaning forward and hitting the top of my head with it.

"Ow! Hey!" I cried, laughing, as I tried to get away from his grasp as he continued to hit me over the head, as if trying to get me to confess to him that I was indeed cheating. (It's not cheating, it was creative strategy.) "Stop!"

"Get her!" Carlos shouted and soon all four boys were holding pillows and hitting me over the head with them as I laughed hysterically, trying to get away.

"Boys, stop hitting Katie with pillows," Mom stated as she walked into the room, barely even looking to see what was going on. I guess having lived with us for so long she could just guess. "Katie, could I talk with you in the kitchen?"

"Sure, mom." I laughed as I pushed Kendall's pillow out of my face and stuck my tongue out at him before getting up and following my mom into the kitchen. "What's up?" I asked as there was a flash of light outside the window, followed by a clap of thunder. I laughed when I heard Carlos' shriek from the other room. I looked over at mom and saw that she was staring at me with a raised eyebrow. "What?" I asked, backtracking, trying to think of what I could have done to make her annoyed.

"Katie," Mom sighed and brushed her hair out of her face. "You and the boys…you're not a little kid anymore."

"Yeah, I'm kind of aware," I replied with a slow nod. "I mean, being in college and all-"

"No, Katie, I mean that you're a woman now," Mom interrupted, and I knew that she was really serious about something. "You can't go rolling around with Kendall and his friends anymore." I raised an eyebrow, waiting for her to finish. Her cheeks flushed a little bit and she continued. "You have breasts...and the guys are older than you-"

"Yeah, by three years," I interrupted. "And so what if I have breasts?" I threw my arms into the air. "I've had them for about six years now, and _I'm _used to it."

"But things aren't the same anymore, Katie." Mom continued. "You can still hang out with them, sure, but you can't continue to roll around with them, and you can't continue to hang out with them as much as you have in the past."

"Meaning?" I rolled a hand, prompting her to continue.

"Meaning, Katie," Mom moved forward and placed a hand on my shoulder. "That things are going to change even if you don't want them to." She gave a soft smile. "That may be a good thing, and it could be a bad thing, but I wanted to warn you first."

"Well thanks for the warning." I looked at my watch. "But I don't have much time before I have to go to work, so could you let me go so I can take a shower before I go?"

"Sure," Mom replied and looked a little annoyed. I stopped and turned back to look at her. "What?"

"Mom, by any chance are you afraid that I'll fall for one of the guys?" I questioned after a second of thought. Mom looked genuinely confused and I took that as a good sign. "Just making sure. Mom, you know that the guys are like my brothers, it would be sooooo disgusting if I ever fell for one of them. Besides, Carlos is dating Stephanie, James is a dater in general, and Logan…well, he's Logan."

"I see that you've been asked that question before." Mom commented as she placed her hands on her hips. Her lips curled into a smile and in a second she was laughing a little. "I'm sorry, but that's just a little ridiculous."

"Yeah, by a lot of fan girls that threatened me," I replied with a snort. "But you know me, mom, its takes me along time to trust guys, and the guys are like my brothers. Nothing's gonna happen." I turned and went to take a shower, but not before I heard mom's mutter.

I wasn't exactly sure, but I think she said 'It's not you that I'm worried about'.

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**A/N: Chapters get longer after this one, but this one I really liked anyway, because you can already see how some of the relationships have changed. At least, from what Mrs. Knight pointed out. I hope you liked this chapter and I'll update soon.**


	6. The Hockey Rink

**The Hockey Rink**

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The next day was like any other Sunday that I have had with my mom, just the fact that my brother was there and his three other loud and overly hungry guys were there too. That could be seen in a good or a bad way, but if you're hungry for breakfast and have a hard time waking up, it's not such a good thing.

Especially if you're me.

I had finally made it downstairs for breakfast, only to stop in my tracks and raise my eyebrows when I saw Kendall and his friends shoveling down food. Now, I wasn't surprised about that at all, as when I was younger I had seen that a lot. But seeing it again, after mom and I were able to cook for two and eat pretty much whatever we wanted with leftovers to spare, it was kind of annoying.

"Katie, I'm going to have to go out and get some more food for you and me to eat," Mom was saying as she paced the kitchen, making sure she had everything. "I forgot how much these guys ate."

"So did I," I muttered in agreement, flicking Kendall on the ear as I walked by him to sit in an empty chair. He just stuck his tongue out in reply. "But don't take too long, I'm starving." I added and gave mom a smile. She raised an eyebrow as she looked at the boys and then turned back to me.

"I am too," she replied and blew a kiss before leaving the house, closing the front door behind her with a loud bang.

"So what did you guys do?" I asked as I grabbed a piece of bacon off of Kendall's plate and bit into it. "Sleep on the floor?"

"No, I slept on the couch," Carlos replied with a smile as he continued to eat his pancakes, even going as far as to speak with his mouth full and wide open. Ok, I had to admit that I was used to that, but it was still disgusting. I could even feel my stomach move three inches to the left out of disgust.

"Yeah, the rest of us had to sleep on the floor," James replied as he looked at his friend darkly. "Do you know how _bad_ that is for my complexion?" he started to frantically move his hands over his face, making sure that he wasn't getting any pimples. "Do you know how much dirt is in the floor?"

"Not enough that it will cause you to get pimples," Logan replied carelessly. "But you could get sick off of it."

"You're such a worry wart, Logie," Kendall laughed as he shook his head, happy that his friends were still acting the same way, even though they had only been apart for a few years.

"You don't have to worry about it," I added as I shook my head. "Mom cleans the house to keep busy, so she doesn't have to worry about poor wittle Kendall being smashed all over the ice," I reached forward and pinched Kendall's cheek on my fingers, moving the flab of skin up and down like a grandmother would do.

"Knock it off!" Kendall pushed my hand away and reached out and messed up my hair in retaliation. He then turned and smirked at Logie. "Always the over analytical and stick in the mud, Logie, huh? Even though you've grown up a little, you still don't take risks."

"That's not true!" I spoke up before Logan could. "He was at the night club that I went to!"

"Thanks for the help Katie, but I can speak up for myself," Logan replied and paused before turning to Kendall, sticking out his tongue. "Nuh-uh! I was at the night club!"

I rolled my eyes.

Boys.

Logan pouted in only a way that he could do it, it was a pout that looked childish, but could still make him seem like he was still a refined person at the exact same time. "I'm not a stick in the mud, contrary to popular belief; I _do_ know how to have fun."

"Yeah, by sticking thermometers up people's asses," Carlos replied and burst out laughing in a high pitched giggle. Kendall laughed along with him.

"Hey, if I know Logie, and I do," James reached out and slapped his friend on the shoulder. "He knows how to have fun. I mean, who was it that came up with the idea that we should play hockey in the Palm Woods?"

Kendall and Carlos slowly raised their hands, trying to hide the smiles that were inching their way on their faces. I knew what was going to happen after this. Kendall was going to say something that would get Logan or James mad and then they were all be shouting at each other and decide to settle it with a hockey match. I knew that it was going to happen, so I just stood up and went to get my coat.

"Kates, where are you going?" Kendall asked with a raised eyebrow as he watched me leave the room.

"Please," I placed a hand on my hip. "We all know that in the next few seconds one of you guys are going to insult the other and then you're going to get so mad that you're going to declare a hockey match." I rolled my eyes and then planted both hands on my hips as I jutted out my left hip. Something that I did whenever I wanted to prove a point. "So you might as well split into the teams of Kendall and Carlos vs. James and Logan and go to the ice rink now, because it would save a lot of time."

"You know, she's right." James commented with a nod. Logan turned around in his chair and gave me a nice half smile.

"Since when did you get so smart?" he asked teasingly. For whatever reason, I could feel my cheeks turning red, and I quickly looked away as I brushed my hair over my shoulder. When I was sure that my cheeks weren't red, I turned back to face the four boys. Kendall raised an inquisitive eyebrow and I ignored him.

"I've always been this smart," I replied with a haughty toss of my hair. "How do you think I made so much money off of you guys."

"You know, she's right." James repeated.

"Let's go then!" Carlos replied and the four boys got up to race to get their coats.

I took a step back and watched as they ran by me, pushing and shoving each other to get their coats before they left to go to the ice rink. It wasn't that it was cold outside in LA; it's just that it was chilly, and when it was chilly and you were going to the ice rink, you were going to want a jacket. Smiling t myself at the familiarity of everything that was going on, I quickly wrote mom a note and then went to get my own jacket, surprised to see that Logan had already grabbed it for me.

"Thanks Logan." I gave a smile and reached out to take my jacket, but he held it out so I could turn and slip my arms into the sleeves.

"It's no problem," Logan replied with a smile of his own and a shrug as I yanked my hair out from the collar. "At least one of us has to be a gentleman." He added sharply throwing a smirk towards his friends.

"She's my sister; I don't have to be a gentleman towards her." Kendall replied with a laugh as he held his hands up defensively. I shoved him on the arm and then wrapped my arm around his waist, leaning into his side, as we left the house and drove to the ice rink.

It was funny because it was the ice rink that Kendall always went to when he wanted some time alone and to make sure he didn't get homesick when he was working with Gustavo. It was also the same ice rink that he and the guys went to when they would play in the charity hockey tournaments that Gustavo would put them in too. So I guess this hockey rink had a special place for all of us. Me especially, because it was a good place to sell the merchandise that I had of the guys.

The ride over to the hockey rink was the same that way that Kendall's and my car rides always went…minus mom. The windows were rolled down, the music was blaring, and Kendall and I were singing at the top of our lungs. Of course Kendall sang better than me, always had been able to, but I liked to spend time with him anyway, even if I was making a fool of myself. As soon as we got into the ice rink, it didn't take long for the guys to start playing again.

The ice rink was huge. There were two ice rinks that were both NHL size. Sometimes, the Anaheim Mighty Ducks (aka the Anaheim Ducks) even came down here to practice. But today, I was here to watch my brother and his friends. But there was one thing wrong with coming to the ice rink and it happened each and every time we came here. Kendall always tried to get me out on the ice and I never wanted to. I wasn't great at skating and I never wanted to embarrass myself. Don't get me wrong I love hockey and hockey players, but I can't skate to save my life. (At least I don't think so.)

"Crap," I mumbled as I laced up the ice skates and folded my jeans over the top of them. Staggering over to the entrance of the ice rink, I tentatively stepped out onto the ice. Immediately, I began to slide around.

I hadn't skated in a long time.

Oh boy.

"C'mon Kates! Stop clinging to the wall!" Kendall called, skating past me at a dangerously fast speed as he tried to keep the puck away from Logan.

"Just leave me alone Kendall! Okay!" I snapped irritably. He only skated off, laughing.

Ugh!

Stupid, annoying big brother.

Why does he have to be such a show-off?

Most of the people here could skate pretty well. There were a few kids clinging to the wall just like me, but they were just little: maybe four or five at the most. When I looked at them, I felt like such a baby. It took me about twenty minutes to get comfortable enough to let go of the wall.

During that time I watched the guys skate around, cheering for Kendall whenever he got the puck, cheering for anyone that scored a goal, and wincing whenever one of the guys got checked into the glass. Even with all of the padding and being used to being checked into the boards, I was still always afraid that they would get hurt. Yeah, I would never admit it out loud, but I always worried whenever one of the guys got hit during hockey. But don't tell anyone, I would just deny it.

I watched as James skated around on the ice, laughing cheerfully as he skated circles around Carlos, who was getting annoyed and started screaming out of annoyance as he tried to take the puck from him. Even though he seemed like such a wimp when he wasn't skating, James was actually really good and not afraid to check any of his friends into the boards. I laughed as he scored a goal and he and Logan went crazy as Kendall hit his hockey stick against the ice as hard as he could. Kendall hated to lose anything, so it didn't surprise me that he was getting a little too worked up.

I slowly glided out onto the open ice, hockey stars and figure skaters racing and twirling by all around me. I watched them with a slight twinge of jealousy, but still made sure to keep myself upright. Then, I fell.

Some hotshot hockey player who was only as old as a twelve year old raced past me, knocking me over. I slid on my knees and broke my fall with my palms. Ugh, this was getting annoying. A kind man who was keeping an eye on things in the rink helped me to my feet. I thanked him and kept going, willing to get used to being on the ice again. Another thing that I hated was the fact that the guys seemed to be able to skate with ease, even after they stopped doing it for a while. But I guess that's what happens when you grew up on the ice back in Minnesota. Me, I was too busy hanging out with my friends and thinking of ways to strike it rich.

Stupid me.

Things were going pretty well, but then I felt myself losing my balance. I kept stumbling and wavering like the leaning tower of Pisa. I began to fall backwards, but then I felt a pair of strong hands catch me and set me right. I turned my head to see who had helped me and let out a breath of relief.

"Watch what you're doin there," James said, letting me go. "You almost cracked your head open on the ice, and your pretty hair doesn't need blood in it."

"Thanks James,"

"No problem." He skated past me, slightly looking over his shoulder as I watched him skate away. I started to skate again, but felt myself wobbling once more. Suddenly, I felt someone grab underneath my arms and spread them out. "C'mon, let me help you." James pushed me forward and I found that I wasn't afraid anymore. "That's it," he said softly. We made a full circle before I stopped and looked at him. "Nice job!"

"Yeah, the first time I've skated a while and I had to get someone to help me," I replied sarcastically. "Nice job, huh?"

"Meh, it could have been a _little_ bit better." James replied as he grabbed onto the hockey stick that seemed to be slipping from his hands.

"A little less small talk and a little more playing, huh?" Kendall asked as he skated by James, nabbing the puck and skating off again. James turned and hurried after him to grab the puck back. I skated back over to the opening of the hockey rink and decided to go and sit in the stands.

That way I could rest my feet, warm up with some hot chocolate, and cheery everyone on.

It was safer that way.


	7. That Would Be Too Weird

**That Would Be Too Weird**

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**"Katie, wake up." I heard Sarah's voice in my ear, which was a sad reminder that I had to get to classes soon.

After the totally fun weekend I just had with the guys, I refused to leave my room to go back to college. Eventually Kendall had to literally pick me up and drag me out to the car so he and mom could drive me back to UCLA. I have a license by my mom always insists on driving me herself. Some sort of bonding I think. Anyway, Sarah could tell that I wasn't happy that I had to wake up; I could see it in her face when I glanced at her, wondering how she was able to get up so early. But I could also see something else in her face, the look that she wanted to get some dirt out of me.

"What?" I asked, not really in the mood for whatever she had to say. "What question about the guys do you want to ask?" I turned towards her and raised an eyebrow as I pulled my hair up into a ponytail. "Is it true that James wears boxers to sleep or does Carlos _really_ sleep with a stuffed animal?" I smiled a little bit when I thought of a few of the many stupid questions that they were asked for magazines.

"That's not really what I wanted to know," Sarah replied as she placed her hands on her hips and looked at me in only a way that an adult could. It was a look that held a mixture of annoyance for being interrupted and sternness. The only way that she could manage that was because she had an 'old soul'. (At least that's what she says.) But then she cocked an eyebrow. "But is that true?"

"Yes with the boxers, no with the stuffed animal." I replied and smiled a little. "At least, not for the past two years." I laughed a little bit. "Actually, Kendall and I were the ones that took the stuffed animal from him." I shook my head, smiling proudly at the thought. "And Carlos _still_ doesn't know that we just shoved it to the back of Kendall's bed."

"Interesting," Sarah smiled and then shook her head. "No, what I wanted to know was what happened after you dropped off me and Charlie back home."

"How is Charlie by the way?" I asked as I walked around Sarah and went over to my closet to get my towel and shower caddie. If you didn't hurry and get a shower in the morning, there would be absolutely no hot water left in the afternoon. And I couldn't be any crankier than I was when I didn't get a hot shower.

Kendall knew that really well and I'm sure that he wouldn't take all of the hot water at home anymore.

Not after what happened last time, but that's another story.

"She had a hangover so bad she was bitching at everyone," Sarah replied and then shrugged. "Not that that's any different, she's always like that," She grabbed onto my shoulder as I started to walk past her and then fixed me with one of her mischievous smiles. "No, what happened with you and Logan?"

"What?" I laughed shortly. "Nothing! He took me home and the guys crashed at my house, annoying me all weekend." I held up my hands as she continued to stare at me. "And that's it! Nothing else happened, they're my friends. My _brothers_! All of them!"

"Oh yeah?" Sarah went over to her dresser and picked up a newspaper, flipping through a few pages before thrusting it at me. "Then what's this?" I scoffed as I took the paper from her and scanned the page, seeing that there was a picture of James and me from the ice rink, where he was helping me skate. I handed it back to her. "Nothing huh? According to this you two are getting pretty cozy."

"Also according to that, someone married Bigfoot and we all know that that can't happen." I rolled my eyes and picked up my shower caddie again. "I've always told you, Sarah, don't trust the tabloids."

"Whatever you say, Knight." Sarah gathered her books and put them in her backpack before slinging it over her shoulder. "You only have History today, right?" she raised her eyebrows in question. "Meet up to go to lunch?"

"Of course." I replied with a nod and grinned as I rubbed my stomach. "Sushi and then Split a plate of barbecue, the typical lunch on Monday afternoons." I brushed my hair over my shoulder and pulled open the door to our dorm. "See you later."

I left my dorm room and headed towards the communal bathroom, greeting some of my friends along the way and laughing when I saw some people racing up and down the hallway on bounce-arounds. Our hall was known to be the partiers and that wasn't completely true, we kept our grades up, but we liked to have a good time. I quickly acquired an empty shower, mentally doing a happy dance and shed my clothes and got into the warm spray of water, smiling as it ran through my hair and down my back. I grabbed my bottle of shampoo and pumped a little bit of the gel into my hands and started to work it through my hair as I thought about what Sarah had said earlier.

Me having a thing for one of the guys, that's just stupid…and sort of true.

I chuckled to myself as I remembered when I was young and when James was convinced that I had a crush on him. It got so bad that I had to go and trick him into signing a contract that said that I had never had and never will have a crush on him.

But that wasn't completely true. I'll admit I had liked him for like _a second_ back when I was eight, before I even really knew what a crush was. Looking back on it now, the only thing that I had ever done to try and get his attention was by changing my hair a little bit.

I had put the curlers in my hair the night before, then in the morning I spent twenty-five minutes sticking all the little bobby pins in it, just to keep it right. I was hoping maybe you'd smile in my direction, or even tell me it looked nice. I even put on nicer clothes. (This is stupid because being eight you didn't really have nice clothes besides t-shirts and shorts.) And…nothing happened.

And then I realized how stupid I was being, how guys were a complete waste of time, and that I was going to spend the rest of my time trying to scam people out of money.

But seriously me dating any of the guys? Well, it would only be between James and Logan as Carlos and Stephanie have been dating for forever. Which reminds me…I have to figure out why Logan and Camille really broke up.

But me and James?

Me and Logan?

EW! No Way!

"Kates, are you ok?" I heard a girl in the stall next to me ask. I could feel my face turning red as I shook my head, even though I knew she couldn't see me. I must have said that out loud.

"I'm fine!" I called back as cheerfully as possibly, trying not to cringe in disgust.

There was no way that I was going to date one of those two.

That would be too weird.

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**A/N: Shorter chapter, but I wanted to show you guys Katie's thoughts for now. The next one will show more of Katie during her classes in college and it will go back to her interactions with the guys.**


	8. Hmm, I'll Have To Think About It

**Hmm…I'll Think About It**

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**"Are you Katie Knight?"

I pulled my ear buds out of my ears and looked up at the girl that was standing in front of me. I've seen the girl around school, Kelly Munroe, apparently she was really popular. But I couldn't figure out what she wanted, I didn't care really, since I was _supposed_ to be studying for a History test. And I need all of the help that I could get because History definitely isn't my best subject.

"Who wants to know?" I asked curiously as I put down her pen, narrowing my eyes at her.

"Yeah, you're definitely Katie." Kelly pulled out the chair across from me and sat down without my permission. I turned off my iPod and rested my arms on top of my books, staring at her, silently telling her to cut to the chase. "I've heard that you can help me."

"It depends on what you need help with," I replied slowly. It was true, I did a lot of things to help students around the campus, most of the things I did I ended up getting money in return for it, but who's counting.

Kelly leaned forward and looked around to make sure that no one was listening. There was no chance of that the only kids that were in here were either in the bookshelves making out or where studying with their iPods blaring in their ears. She cleared her throat before speaking. "This is a little embarrassing." She started out cautiously. "But I've been a fan of your brother and his friends for a long time and I was wondering if you could get them to sign my CDs."

At that she pulled three cases out of her backpack and I instantly recognized them as the three CDs that the boys had made before their reign as Big Time Rush had ended; BTR, Big Time Break, and Big Time Live. Their two studio CDs and their one live CD. I listen to them every now and then, whenever I'm bored or if I miss my brother (not that he needs to know.)

"Anyone in particular you want these signed by, or by all of them?" I questioned as I took the CDs from and mentally calculated what she was going to owe me after all of this was done.

"Um, yeah," Kelly blushed as she lowered her head. "I would like Logan in particular to sign it." She gave a smile. "He's my favorite one out of the guys."

I paused as I studied her. I don't know it was kind of weird to hear that Logan was her favorite. Usually I heard James or my brother as the ones that all the girls loved. Don't get me wrong as a whole they were popular and they were all good looking in their own way, but it was still interesting to hear. I cleared my throat and put the CDs away in my bag, taking my time as I lifted myself back up into my chair. I folded my hands and set them on the table and looked Kelly in the eye before speaking.

"I'm going to need some cash up front for doing the delivery," I stated as I held out my hand, noticing how quickly Kelly moved to grab her purse. "The rest will come after I get the CDs signed."

"Of course," Kelly handed me two five dollar bills and I inspected them before sliding them into my pocket. "Thank you so much Katie, you're the best."

"I try." I replied before looking at my watch. "Ugh, gotta get to History." I muttered and gathered my stuff before sticking a hand out towards Kelly and smirking. "It's a pleasure doing business with you." I declared. What was business anyway? I barely worked and all I had to do was get my brother and his idiotic friends to sign stuff.

If getting a job in the real world was much harder, I didn't want one, especially not with these Big Time Rushers, as Gustavo had put it, floating around. I probably wouldn't have to become a lawyer, but I know that until I prove to my mom that I can get by with my sales off of my brothers I was stuck going to college. But you'd figure that I would have proven that to her when I made most of my college funds from their first concert. But mom is mom and she's very overprotective so I understand what she means.

"Nice doing business with you too," Kelly grabbed my hand and shook it hard. I blinked and tired to pull my hand away, but she had a tight grip on it. "Thank you! Thank you so much!"

"No problem" I replied, finally being able to tear my hand away before she got up and rushed out of the library. I flexed my hand, making sure that my fingers weren't crushed before grabbing my backpack and heading out of the library.

I shielded my face against the sunlight before starting the short walk across the campus to get to the building that held my History class as well as other English classes and a computer lab. I noticed a lot of students walking away from the building and saw that most of them were in my class.

"What's going on?" I muttered under my breath.

"Kates!" I craned my head and saw Stephen, one of my close friends and classmates, rushing towards me. He and I were in the same history class, and we were both bad at it. Usually we would be writing notes back or doodling back and forth to each other to pass the time. "Kates, hold up!"

"Hey Stephen!" I replied and gave a bright smile. "What's up?" I asked when he reached my side, breathing heavily, having run so fast. But I also couldn't miss the giant smile that was on his face. "You look like you just won the lottery."

"Close enough," he replied and gave me a giant hug, wrapping his arms around my waist before spinning me in a circle. "We don't have History today! It was cancelled!" He gave me a big, sloppy kiss on the cheek, causing me to laugh.

Ok, just so you know, Stephen isn't gay and we're not romantically involved at all. I had never thought of him that way and he never thought of me that way. Besides, he has a girlfriend that he has been dating for the past three years.

"That's awesome!" I replied and then groaned as he dropped me back to my feet. "That means that I could have slept in this morning. I brought all this stuff for nothing."

"Eh, just drop it off in your dorm room," Stephen replied and lightly punched me on the arm. "We can go get some early lunch to celebrate. I'll drive."

"Thanks, but this means that I can get some laundry done," I replied as I shook my head and tucked my hair behind my ear. "Besides Sarah and I already have plans for lunch."

"Alright, let's hang out later then, promise?" Stephen asked as he started to back away.

"Sure," I replied and waved to him before heading off into the other direction.

Yeah, I did have a lot of laundry to do and I've been putting it off for so long there was a giant pile of clothes falling out of my laundry basket. And I hate to admit it, but my room was starting to smell as well. Sarah was always teasing me about it, but I never believed her, besides if she ever started I just shot back saying that she snored in her sleep. Which was true, but she was always so embarrassed about it. The last time I tried that was at work, and she was so embarrassed that she dropped a stack of plates on the ground, equaling up to a month of her paycheck.

It was the last time that I did that in public, but I still did it just to get on her nerves.

I quickly went to my room and dropped off my backpack before grabbing my laundry basket, knowing I had to get to the laundry room before all the washers were taken up. Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays were the days that most people did their laundry. I stripped my sheets off of my bed and threw my towels into the basket, grabbing detergent and quarters on my way out. I dragged the overflowing basket down to the laundry room, where I was greeted by the pounding sound of dryers. Seeing two free washers next to each other, I opened them both and threw my clothes into them. After starting both machines, I sat down with my laptop to wait.

Thirty minutes later, my watching TV was interrupted by loud buzzing. I trudged up to the washers and opened them, only to find that my sheets had again tangled themselves up with my clothes. Letting out a huge sigh, I got to work pulling apart the various pieces so they wouldn't wrinkle in the dryer. Jeans were the worst. I pulled one leg free only to find the other trapped in three different ways. Finally I dumped the heap of cloth into a dryer and sat down to wait some more.

When I heard the buzz again, I approached the dryer and opened it apprehensively, giving a sigh of relief when my clothes didn't fall out onto my head. I reached in and pulled out a sheet. And kept pulling and pulling until there really was a pile of cloth on my head.

Have I mentioned I hate sheets?

I growled and began my search for corners… until I heard a low chuckle somewhere to my left. Shoving the cloth away from my face, I saw a tall skinny guy approaching me.

"Want some help with that?" he asked, not bothering to hide his amusement.

"No," I huffed, "I've got it, thanks."

"You know, most people wouldn't mind having an extra pair of hands for these things," he replied, taking half of the sheet and holding the corners. I looked at him blankly. He sighed and stepped forward to take the other two corners out of my hands. I watched in silence as he folded the sheet easily, even making the creases straight, the way I always tried to but never managed.

I was more cooperative with the rest of my sheets, and we had them all folded in minutes. "Thanks," I muttered, "I guess that was easier."

"Sure thing," he grinned, as another dryer went off. He glanced at me and asked, "Care to help me with mine?"

"Okay." I mean, it was only fair. I followed him to his dryer, rubbing my chin, trying to think of where I had seen him before. But I couldn't think of anything what so ever. Together we folded his sheets. Every time he stepped closer to take the corners, I ducked my head so he wouldn't notice. After we were done, I grabbed my basket, trying to get back to my room as quickly as possible.

"Wait!" I heard right as I passed the door. I turned slowly and saw him standing awkwardly a few steps away from his laundry. "Um, having someone to help really does make it easier. Same time next week?"

I stared at him, still trying to figure out where I had seen his face before and when he smiled I finally got it. It was Dak Zevon. The one guy that I had ever dated in my life and it ended in disaster, back when I was sixteen. I should had seen it coming really, because he was about two years older than me it should have been obvious that he wasn't going to be able to stay with one girl.

Especially when it came to the fact that he was chased by girls almost every day of his life.

Part of me wondered what he was doing there.

But an even greater part of me was pissed off and wanted to know why he was there.

Thankfully he answered my question without me having to ask it, letting me know that he could tell that I wasn't happy to see him.

"I realized that I didn't want to only be a Popstar who acted a little bit on the side," Dak explained quickly, his smile fading completely. "I wanted t to go to school so I could figure out what I wanted to do with my life. I didn't know you went here."

"Right." I replied shortly. I didn't believe him for a second and there was no way that I was going to act like nothing had happened between us. I had completely forgotten about how hurt I was when he dumped me, but now it was all rushing back.

"But," Dak grabbed his basket and turned back to me, a pleading expression in his eyes. "Now that we're both here, I was wondering if we could talk," he licked his lips. "About everything that happened."

"I don't think so." I replied and left the room. I heard his footsteps behind me.

"Don't tell me…you have a boyfriend right?" Dak questioned. I turned around and glared at him, hoping that he would take the hint. "Not that it's any of my business." Yep, he got the point.

"You're right, it isn't any of your business," I replied as calmly as possible. "And even though it's not your business, I don't have a boyfriend and I'm not interested in anyone right now. I'm focusing on my studies."

"That's good." Dak nodded in approval and that made me even angrier than I was before. "But...please…can we still talk? Over coffee or something?"

"I'll have to think about it, Dak." I stated, tightening my grip on my basket before turning and walking quickly back to my room. I closed the door behind me, but not before checking to see if he was following me. It was a good thing that he wasn't or I would have shoved the door into his sinuses. As soon as I placed my laundry basket on my bed my phone rang, letting me know I got a text.

I unlocked my phone and saw that it was a text from James.

**I'm in the area, running over my lines for my movie and I have some time off. Want to hang out or something? – James**

I raised an eyebrow before replying to his text.

_Don't you think it's a little weird that you're going to hang out with your best friends' sister?_

I got a reply just as quickly.

**Not at all, you're not just my best friend's little sister, you're my friend too and friends can hang out, right?**

I smiled.

_Right. Pick me up at 8._

_

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_**A/N; Alright, next chapter up and now you see a bit more of Dak in there. Throughout the story I'm going to explain what happened with their relationship as well as the main plot for the story. So I hope you guys like it. Anyway, I of course don't have anything against us Big Time Rush fans (or Big Time Rushers) because we're just supporting one of the best bands in the world. :) Hope you enjoyed the chapter, I'm updating With Friends Like These III: Here and Now next.**

**-Riley**


	9. The Pier

**The Pier**

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**"Hey James," I greeted with a wave as I hurried over to where he was leaning on a 2010 Camaro Convertible.

The only way that I knew about cars and how they work was because of hearing the guys talk about it all the time as soon as they hit their teenage years. I never understood the fascination with guys and cars, but I had to admit that it was a pretty sweet car.

He looked up and waved back, but not before smiling and nodding at two blondes that walked by him, giggling as they went. I rolled my eyes as I slowed to a walk, typical James, should have guessed that there was an ulterior motive to him wanting to pick me up at the campus.

"Hey Katie," he shoved his hands into his pockets and got off of the car. "What's wrong?" he asked, peering at my face. I screeched to a halt, my ponytail lightly bobbing back and forth.

"How did you know that there's something wrong?" I questioned, slightly surprised.

James grinned, his white teeth gleaming. "You're forgetting that I was there when you were born, so I've known you for a long time." He explained. "And from the many times that the guys and I had to help Kendall babysit you, I know whenever there's something wrong with you."

"Oh," I sighed a little, knowing that I was going to have to tell him eventually anyway. "I ran into Dak…he goes to this school now."

"Oh," James repeated and looked a little uncomfortable. "Are you ok? Do you not want to hang out, because I can-"

"I wouldn't have come all this way and even dressed up a little not to want to get off campus." I interrupted as I walked over to the passenger side of the car and got in, smiling at the familiar smell of the leather seats. "Nice car, is this one new?"

"It's not even mine." James replied as he got into the driver's seat and closed the door behind him. "It's the car that I'm using for my movie," he grinned sheepishly. "They don't even know that I took it."

"I'm sure they'll figure it out when the paparazzi gets wind of you going out with someone," I replied teasingly, reminding James of all of the problems that he and the guys have had with their privacy ever since they formed Big Time Rush. "They might even say that you got me pregnant or something." I added with a light chuckle.

"Or that you're some sort of ex-girlfriend that's only going out with me for my money," James agreed, laughing as well as he pulled out of the parking lot and drove away from the school.

I smiled as the warm wind hit our faces as we drove along LA, the lights from the buildings and billboard sings brightening up the night. Even though LA had really bad smog output, LA was probably one of my favorite places to live. There was always something to do and someone to hang out with. Sure I missed my home in Minnesota, but LA was my second home and I don't know what my life would have been like if we didn't move here.

"I'm guessing you have classes tomorrow so I won't keep you out late," James stated as he stopped at the beach, turning off the car. "Let's get some ice cream and catch." He suggested as we climbed out of the car. "We can sit on the pier."

"Sure!" I replied eagerly when I noticed that he was pointing over to the ice cream parlor that was on the pier.

I remembered when Kendall would take me to the beach and he would always get me ice cream from that one ice cream parlor. It's the best ice cream that you could ever have in LA. I love it almost as much as I love In-N-Out.

"Chocolate-Vanilla?" James guessed as he pulled his wallet out of his back pocket and started to count his money as we walked over to it.

"You remembered." I stated, smiling a little.

"It's hard to forget the one thing that you tricked us into giving you whenever we babysat you." James stated as we stepped up to the window. He told the cashier what we wanted and waited patiently. "I'm surprised that we didn't accidentally lose your or anything the many times that we failed in babysitting you."

"How do you think I learned to fend for myself?" I asked as I rolled my eyes. "You guys were the _worst_ babysitters that I have ever had."

"Hey, we did ok for four guys had never really babysat before." James defended himself. "I mean, Logan, Carlos, and I did a good job. Kendall was usually the one that went hysterical, trying to figure out what was making your cry or what was making you upset."

"Had it ever occurred to you that I was doing that on purpose to watch you guys go crazy?" I asked as the cashier came back with our ice cream cones. James took them and handed me mine carefully. I smiled as I licked the frozen treat, grinning as the familiar taste hit my tongue.

"You were only two years old," James replied as we turned and started to walk across the pier. "How were we supposed to know that you were that devious when we were that young?" He reached out and lightly shoved my shoulder.

I laughed as I regained my balance, making sure that my ice cream cone didn't fall over. We continued to walk along the pier as we ate our ice cream, talking about everything that had happened to the two of us as we had grown up. I was kind of sad at first, remembering all of the times after the guys had moved out and started to do their own thing and how lonely I was, but soon I was laughing along with every story that James told of something embarrassing happening on set of whatever film he was doing.

James was always good at making me laugh.

Finally sat on the pier, the lighthouse giving us a little light from about a mile away. Our feet swung about the black salty water. There was only a light layer of fog surrounding us. The waning moon was above, mingling with the stars.

"Have you ever thought about just hopping a boat and getting the hell out of here?" James' quiet voice reached my ears after a few moments of comfortable silence between the two of us.

"I don't think so, why?" I replied in a voice just as quiet as his. I had never thought of it before, I would never really know what to do if I ever did want to get out of LA, away from my friends and my mom. It was a weird thought. Almost as weird as the thought of us moving out here in the first place. But I had gotten used to it.

"I dunno. It's just this place seems so… I don't know how to really describe it." James sighed and then turned towards me, smiling a little. "Keep a secret?" he questioned.

"Of course." I replied as I crossed an 'x' over my heart to show how serious I was.

"Secretly," James turned back towards the ocean, staring at it as if it was going to change. "I don't like it here…." He paused. "At least, not as much as I used to."

"But, we grew up here." I tore my gaze from the black water to him. "Kind of. Your band grew up here; your guys' friendship grew even stronger while you were here."

"I know." James replied as he scratched his forehead. "But it's just that it feels like this town is against me. All of these people that just want me to fail; the ones that are constantly following me around and trying to make me break." He rubbed his nose. "Did you know that they called my mom back home and told her that I said so many awful things about her?"

"No way!" I cried in shock. "That's so mean and stupid!"

"I know," James laughed bitterly. "She didn't believe it, because she and I have this special connection." He laughed. "I'm kind of embarrassed about it, but its coll." He frowned. "It was things like that that made me want to get away from here." He fell silent again and I turned my eyes to the water again. We stayed silent for a long time. "Are you going to come with me?"

"Huh?" I looked up at him, wrinkling my nose in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"I meant get on a ship and leave." James replied as he motioned out to the water. "I have enough money to buy two tickets, and wherever we go enough to rent an apartment so we can find jobs."

"Are you sure?" I knew he was joking, but I wanted to humor him anyway.

"Yeah." James nodded seriously, as if he had been planning this for a long time. "It can work out perfectly." He turned to look at me, his eyes flashing excitedly. "As for the jobs, I heard about this one island not far from here so the tickets will be cheaper. They've been attracting some tourists so there are businesses looking for more help, right?"

"I guess." I pulled my legs back from under the railing and started to put my shoes back on. I enjoyed spending time with James, and conversations like these, where we could talk about anything and didn't judge each other was my favorite thing about all of it. "But are you sure that we should just leave everything behind?"

He smiled. "I'll stay if you want to stay. We'll go if you want us to go."

"It's all on my decision?" He nodded and I rolled my eyes as I turned away from him. "Gee thanks." I laughed and he laughed as well. "Great, I have the biggest decision of my life to make, right here and right now." I stood up and brushed off my shorts. "I'll get back to you on that." I replied jokingly and lightly hit him on the shoulder. "But for now, I need to get back to the campus, there's still some homework that I have to do."

James laughed as well as he stood up and brushed off his pants. "As you wish, my dear."

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**A/N: Yeah I know, a short chapter, but it was supposed to be short, so I hope that you guys liked it anyway. I'll update again soon. **

**Peace,**

**-Riley**


	10. ExBoyfriend

**Ex-Boyfriend**

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**I sat in my science class, trying not to scream in annoyance. Unfortunately for me, Dak was in the class and he was sitting behind me, but I could feel his eyes burning into my back. I had forgotten all about him last night when I was hanging out with James, but now that he was this close to me, physically and mentally, it was driving me insane.

He was trying to be nice and by my friend again, I could tell. But I was never one to be nice to those who hurt me and I 'm sure that Kendall would be very proud of me if he knew what was going on. But I wasn't sure if I was going to tell him, I don't even know why I told James that he was around again.

The first time I met him was when I saved him from all of those fan girls at the studio when I tried to get his autograph. He must have thought I was pretty weird. But then I met him again at one of the guys' parties for their success with their band, and I was calm cool and collected. Kendall introduced us again, although he had an amused expression on his face, probably still remembering what happened last time.

Dak had said he recognized me and I was sure that he was being polite. How many girls that had chased him down did he really remember? And what was I supposed to say, he was so goddamn hot! It was almost nauseating. He was so hot. I know that if I ever said that around my brother, he would freak out and act like my dad again. So the only people that I actually openly admitted it to were Jo, Stephanie, and Camille. My mom was supposed to come pick me up from the party around nine; but she never got there. Dak told me he wanted to take me home if my mom didn't show up in the next ten minutes. She didn't. I left a message on her cell telling her I got a ride and would talk to her when I got home.

As I got into the car something felt, felt very right about sitting in this seat next to him. Like the seat was made for me. Like, he was made for me. When he dropped me off at my house he asked me for my number I gave him my apartment and cell numbers. He told me he wanted to see me again. We started seeing each other. A lot. His famous friends became my friend and Kendall freaked out. I thought we would be together forever. Then something must have gone wrong and I must have not noticed.

Because two years later he broke up with me.

I felt like my life had lost all meaning. I guess I thought we would have broken up, but I guess I thought maybe I would have broken up with him not vice versa.

He was my life, my world, the reason I lived as much as I hate to say it.

I still don't even know why he broke up with me and at this point, I didn't care.

I was so happy when class ended I practically flew out of my seat, dropping a few of my books on the way. I tried to pick them up as quickly as I could, because I knew that Dak was going to try and talk to me, but I didn't move fast enough.

"Here," he bent down and grabbed my last book and handed it to me with a half smile.

"Thanks" I replied shortly and grabbed it from his hand. I noticed that a lot of girls in the class were glaring my way. "Bye!" I gave a quick wave and turned and started to move out of the room as fast as I could.

"Katie, can we please talk?" Dak grabbed onto my arm.

I pulled my hand out of his grasp and continued out of the room, but I could hear him following behind me. "Sorry," I apologized, not really meaning it. I was getting restless and couldn't stand being around him much longer. "I have to work and I'm going to be late if I didn't go now."

That was a complete lie, I had another class to go to and then I was going to meet with Sarah to get to work.

Dak let go of my arm and I hurried away as fast as I could.

For whatever reason, tears stung my eyes and I tried my hardest not to let them fall.

He was my ex-boyfriend…so why did he still have this effect on me?

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**A/N: Short chapter, but I wanted you guys to get into Katie's head about how she felt with Dak being around. The next chapter has Kendall, Logan, James, Carlos, Jo, Stephanie, and Camille. So I hope that you guys are waiting patiently for it. I'll update again soon because I know that you loved the last chapter so much. ^-^**

**-Riley**


	11. Some Girl Stuff

**Some Girl Stuff**

**A/N: Sorry guys, I know I said that this chapter was going to have the guys in it, but it only has the girls. Everyone will be in the next chapter though.**

**

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**"Katie, why are you at work if all you're going to do is your homework?"

I looked up and grinned as Jacob walked over to me and sat down at the end of the table that I was working at. He swiped up one of my packets and flipped through it as I continued to scribble some notes down in my notebook. I was sitting in the break room, working on homework as there weren't many people in the restaurant.

Duke and Liam, the owners and the cooks of the restaurant (they're brothers) had made a special place for me back there after I had explained to them that I had to rush over to the restaurant after school or after I had done my homework. They both agreed that they would let me do my work whenever I had a break or go to the room and allow me to stay back there even if I didn't work that day, if I just needed a some peace and quiet from college.

Having that, and being able to go back home every weekend made it

"I have to get this stuff done so I can have the rest of the night free." I replied as I mentally calculated everything that I had to do. "I have to finish writing down these notes for my history class and then I have some Sociology homework to do as well."

"How can you stand this crap?" Jacob questioned as his brown eyes flicked over the pages before tossing the packet back at me.

"It's not crap," I denied as I grabbed the paper before it hit my face. "It's actually pretty interesting, since I want to be a lawyer and everything."

Jacob made a snorting sound at the back of his throat and I made a disgusted face, thinking that he was getting ready to hock a loogie or something. But he just rolled his eyes towards me as he ran his fingers through his blue hair.

"I thought that you didn't want to be a lawyer?" he stated, smiling cheekily as he crossed his arms over his chest. "I mean, weren't you the one that, for the first few months of UCLA, came stomping into work every day complaining about how your mom made you go into such a stupid major?"

"Yeah," I laughed as I rolled my eyes. "But then I realized how being a lawyer can be really cool," I shrugged modestly. "Plus, I'll be making a difference in someone's life."

"Or ruining it." Jacob ho-humed.

He laughed as I hit him on the arm.

"Flirting?" Charlie teased as she moved in between me and Jacob and rested her arms on the table as she smiled at the two of us. "Let's see Jatie or Kacob?" she asked, mashing our names together. "Which do you think sounds better?"

"Kacob?" Jacob commented as he burst out laughing, throwing his head back. "What kind of a smushing name is that? It sounds like a kind of a dessert maker."

"Besides," I rested my arm on Charlie's back and leaned against her. "I'm way too good for him." I looked at Jacob and gave him a wink.

He put his hand over his heart and gasped loudly.

"That hurts, Kates," he pretended to cry. "That really, really, hurts."

"Hey, what's going on?" Sarah hurried over, putting up her notepad and joined us. I laughed as she flopped on top of Jacob's lap and asked repeatedly what we were doing.

I can honestly say that these guys were my best friends and it was days like this that I really enjoyed. It was the kind of day where there was a long lull between costumers and we could goof off any way that we wanted. One time we even had a basketball game at the back of the restaurant with a bouncy ball and two wastebaskets. Another time Jacob had found a large spider and chased Sarah around with it (she's terrified of spiders) and then put it in the microwave and cooked it. Needless to say, it blew up after only a few seconds.

It was gross but cool at the same time.

Charlie and Sarah are the ones that I go to whenever I need advice, mostly on guys, and on homework and stuff. Sarah is definitely my bestie, as we're roommates and we're always hanging out with each other as well as Stephen and his girlfriend Holly. Charlie was like one of our family, even though she was out of college and seemed that she would be too good to work at this restaurant. Jacob and I, I can honestly say that we flirt a lot, but there's no way that we would go out. He was the first guy that I met when I started working at Silver Spring and it would be way too awkward if we started to date. After the guys had left to go do their own thing, he was kind of the space holder for me; the guy that I _always _went to when I was bored.

But it was still really cool that we could all hang out and not judge each other.

We were still goofing around when we heard the sound of the bell over the door to the restaurant ding and the sound of girl's laughter.

"Darn it," Sarah groaned as she brushed her hair out of her face. "I don't want to work yet."

"You may not have to," Jacob stated as he lifted a finger and got up from the table. He strode over to the door and then turned around to face us girls, an evil grin on his face. "Ten bucks that it's Katie's table."

"Whoa," I stood up and placed my hands on my hips. "What makes you think that it's my table?"

"Because you're like, the only one that's actually capable of having customers return," Jacob replied as if it was obvious. He motioned over to Charlie. "Her impatience is the driving force when it comes to people asking for the rest of us," Charlie stuck her tongue out at him as he motioned to Sarah. "She's a klutz and will drop at least one dish every time she works." He ignored Sarah's outraged cry as he motioned to himself. "And when people see me, they take one look and want to have a different server, even if I'm the only one available."

"He's got a point." Sarah commented lazily.

Jacob smirked before pushing open the door and disappearing from sight as he checked to see what table the girls had taken. He came back with his fists in the air and a triumphant look on his face.

"Ha!" He cried gleefully. "I was right; they're at Kates' table so that means that each of you owe me ten bucks." He started to dance, badly, in triumph.

"You'd think that," I grabbed my notepad and my pen. "But I didn't agree to the bet." I stated as I walked by him and out the door. As the door swung shut behind me, I could hear Jacob arguing with Sarah and Charlie that they owed him money.

I could also hear the melodious sound of pots and pans clanging together, along with the sound of running water. I couldn't help but smile, all of those sounds were familiar and very comforting. Along with the sound of my friends arguing in the background.

As I turned the corner to go over to my table, I let out an involuntary little shriek when I recognized my friends, Jo Taylor, Stephanie King, and Camille Sanders. I quickly hurried over and gave them big hugs as they chattered on about how big I had grown and asking what I was doing.

"Working obviously," I replied excitedly as I slid into the booth with them. "And getting as much work done as soon as possible so I can become a lawyer."

"Oh yeah, Kendall mentioned that." Jo agreed with a pleased smile and a nod. "You do have what it takes to be a lawyer, you can definitely scare people." She laughed. "Like all those times you scared Bitters when we were back at the Palm Woods."

"I can honestly say that that has helped me with my films," Stephanie laughed with agreement, pulling her hair out of her face. She held her hands up in the air as if it was a camera. "A montage of Bitters screaming and rampaging through the hotel." She giggled a little. "One of my best actually."

"Anyway," I waved my hands as I looked back and forth from each girl. "What's going on with all of you guys?"

"Well, when I'm not at Kendall's hockey games," Jo rolled her eyes. "Which believe me, are the most boring thing on the planet, I'm working on my new TV show." Her eyes lit up as they always did when she talked about her acting. "Actually, we're getting ready to do a movie based off of the show, so that should be fun."

"So when are you and Kendall going to get married?" I asked, getting to the point. I smiled at her blush. "I really want you as my sister."

"That's good to know," Jo laughed. "But I don't think right now is a good time, for both of our careers, to worry about a marriage yet." She turned to Stephanie, who was shaking her head, a smirk on her face. "What are you smirking about? When are you and _Carlos_ going to get married?" she teased playfully.

I looked at Camille out of the corner of my eye, she had been quiet this whole time and that wasn't like her. Usually she made a big entrance about everything and I'm trying to understand what could be bothering as I listened to Stephanie.

"You know Carlos," Stephanie rolled her eyes a little. "You never know when he's going to surprise you with a hug attack or when he's going to be serious and take you out to dinner." She shrugged. "So I'm not going to stress about it."

"Why don't you propose to _him_?" Camille suggested, her eyes twinkling at the idea. "That would definitely surprise him.

"Yeah," Stephanie wrinkled her nose. "But I believe that it's more of a guy thing if he proposes. I don't know," she scratched her forehead. "I'm kind of old fashioned with that kind of thing."

"That's cool." I reassured her and then looked over at Camille. "What about you?" I asked with a teasing lift in my voice. "You've been kind of quiet, have something that you're trying to hide?"

"Sort of," Camille tried to smile but it faded quickly. She cupped her chin in her hand. "Logan and I broke up a couple of weeks ago."

Jo and Stephanie looked shocked, but I wasn't surprised at all. I knew eventually that she or Logan was going to spill as to why they broke up, and I would rather get it out of her, because I knew that Logan, being the sometimes arrogant and cocky guy that he can be, he would downplay it if something bad had happened.

"Really?" Jo looked upset.

"I knew that something was bothering you," Stephanie reached out and gently knocked on Camille's hand. "Why didn't you tell us earlier?" She turned the bottom corner of her mouth down as Camille shrugged quietly.

"I don't know," she looked at her hands. "I didn't want to make you guys upset because you guys are friends too."

Jo finally spoke up again. "I don't get it, you two were perfect for each other." She commented.

"Yeah, well," Camille rubbed the back of her neck. "We felt that for now we were better off as friends. Logan is still studying to become a doctor and he works so hard at it that he didn't really have much time for me anymore and because I've been doing all of this theatre stuff and I've had to do performances in different states every two days, so it was hard to see each other."

"Oh, well," I tried to find the right words to say. "At least you guys agreed to the breakup, it would have been worse if you broke up on bad terms." I added, trying to look on the bright side of things. "And you guys are still friends so you can still hang out."

"Yeah, I guess it's better than nothing." Camille finally smiled as she looked at me. "What about you? Any boyfriends?"

"No," I rolled my eyes, knowing that it would have gotten to me eventually. "Just a bunch of guy friends. I don't have time for a boyfriend right now, I'm too busy working on my homework and working here to be able to have time to date someone."

"That's good thinking," Stephanie agreed with a teasing smile. "You have all the time in the world to get a boyfriend that you can spend the most of your time with."

"You're only saying that because you've been dating Carlos for years." I stated as I rolled my eyes. "No need to flaunt it in my face."

"You would have agreed to go out with him too I f he continued to ask you out every day for two months." Stephanie stated, looking kind of annoyed. "It was sweet at first then it got very, _very_ annoying."

"What are you guys doing this weekend?" Jo asked suddenly. "Kendall and Carlos have a hockey game this weekend and I would _really _love it if you guys could come so I wouldn't be there by myself, bored, and having no one to talk to."

"Sure thing," I agreed with an excited smile. "I haven't been to a hockey game in a long time. I love watching them play."

"You also love screaming to encourage someone to get checked into the boards." Stephanie commented dryly. "Why don't we make a night out of it?" she suggested. "All of us haven't been together for a long time; we can go to dinner afterwards."

"As long as I don't have to be the waitress, no problem." I joked and the girls laughed.

"That sounds like a _really_ good idea," Camille smiled, looking like herself again. "I've missed the guys. Count me in too."

"Great," I smiled and stood up and grabbed my notepad from the front pocket of my apron and held a pencil over it. "Now, that reminds me that I need to take your guys' orders and get them back to the cooks before I lose my job."

"Don't worry," Camille smiled warmly. "We're going to give you a nice big tip."

"Thanks," I felt relieved. "Because the last friend that I had here was James, and he barely tipped me at all."

* * *

**A/N: Alright, exam week is almost over, my last exam is an open book/note Wednesday morning, so that means that all during Christmas break I'll be able to update my stories and the next chapter, when they're all at the hockey game, will be much longer than this one. I hope you guys liked it anyway. All chapters after this will be longer.**

**Oh and for the part where Stephanie says that she's not a dancer, I got that off of the actress that plays her, Tristin Mays. She is a choreographer and loves to dance, so I decided to put that with Stephanie.**

**Cheers,**

**Riley**


	12. The Hockey Game

**The Hockey Game**

**

* * *

**"Go Kendall! Go Carlos!" I cheered as the Minnesota Wild moved onto the ice to start their warm-ups before the game started.

Kendall looked up and waved back towards us as he skated by, before moving his helmet back down and sharply tuning to line up behind his teammates to take shots on the goal, just to warm up the goalie.

I smiled as I sat back down in my seat, bringing my scarf closer around my neck as I watched the Pittsburg Penguins skate on the other side of the rink. The two teams are big rivals and I couldn't wait to see how this game would play out. Of course I wanted Kendall and Carlos to win, but the whole game in general would still be awesome.

"Wow Katie," Camille remarked as she pulled her jacket over her lap, shivering a little. "You really love this sport don't you?"

"Of course!" I laughed incredulously. "Where else can you watch people smash each other into solid objects and get away with it?"

"You definitely didn't change much over the years." Jo teased as she lightly hit me on the arm. I laughed and rolled my eyes as I continued to scan the stands, wondering where James and Logan were and when they were going to get here as the game was going to start soon.

I was actually a little worried about James, ever since he told me that he wanted to leave LA and everything that he had done, my first thought was that he was suicidal. But I knew that wasn't it, James was way too happy and I knew that he had thought about what happened to his hair after he offed himself. I don't mean that to be funny, but all James did think about was his hair and his face, so it wouldn't surprise me if he did that.

Logan, I was worried about too. I had called him, asking if he wanted to come to the game and he agreed readily, but when I told him that Camille was going to be there, he became very quiet and ended the call quickly. I thought that was really strange, because Camille said that the two of them were just friends now, but I guess it would be hard if you were at a game with your ex-girlfriend. Maybe he was bringing a date, I didn't really care.

I don't like drama.

But Camille was right about one thing, my love for hockey.

I love everything about it.

And I mean everything.

It's a good idea to know what you're getting into before you even leave your house. One important thing to remember; it will be cold. The game is played on ice, and the rinks need to be kept at a low temperature so that the fast-paced, action packed hockey game will not become a sluggish, barely moving splish-splash show. Because of this, you will need to dress accordingly. I cannot stress this point enough. There is always those crazy people at hockey games, huddled into themselves, cursing and mumbling about the lack of heat. More often than not, these people are not wearing proper clothing for the circumstances. These people are a fine example of mental incompetency. Use your common sense when deciding what to wear. I suggest jeans, a T-shirt, and a sweatshirt, or just a long sleeved shirt/sweater. An item that should factor into your outfit is a good pair of running shoes. Sometimes you will find yourself needing to run very fast and very far, and you don't want to twist your ankle in a pair of stylish-yet-unstable heels.

Another decision that is key to preparation is made when you arrive at the game. Choosing where to sit may not seem like a big deal, but your goals, planning and quick-thinking skills should all be taken into account when sitting. For instance, if you plan on annoying other spectators, sit as far away from the action as possible so that you can keep up an endless litany of "What happened? What just happened? What happened when I asked 'what just happened?' What happened..." and so on and so forth.

If you plan on throwing things at the players, sit closer to the boards surrounding the ice. If you want to be yelling at the players, or the other team's fans, sit with a large group of people. (If you choose the third option, be prepared to be yelled at, and quite possibly chased after. Your running shoes are particularly useful for this option.)

Now, that's just the fun before the game. Everything gets better when the game actually starts. For example, when a member of the other team rams into (checks) a member of your team, use all the insults in your mind to express your indigence. When your team gets a goal, passionately cheer out your pride. Whenever the appearance of blood or a fight makes itself known, just make happy noise, because you can't go wrong with a bloody hockey fight. But let me tell you, when a member of my team is checked and is pressed up against the sideboards, I suddenly know that the other team is "Midget-sucking Gap-wearing pieces of meat!" Jacob yelled this to the opposite team at the last game we attended last year (I made him go), after a three members of said opposite team simultaneously attacked our goalie. It remains as the best, most creative insult I've heard yet.

Being creative is one of the most important parts of hockey watching. If you continuously use the same insults time after time, people will stop listening to you and they will cease to be effective.  
For those of you who don't like to make fun of other people's shortcomings, there are other ways to be creative besides insulting. Songs are a hit with everyone. Not only are you not hurting anyone's delicate feelings (unless the song is written about the other team's body odor and sexual habits) but finding words to rhyme is an adventure all by itself. Chants are shorter, but no less fun. Repeating things is always a great way to pass the time and support your team.

There are many more things that I could explain as to why I love hockey, but that would probably bore people.

"Hey, there're the guys!" I stated and leapt to my feet, pointing over to James and Logan as they tried to weave their way through the many fans that packed the stadium. I saw James fall once and almost giggled out loud when I saw him shrug off help to make sure his hair way ok.

I saw Logan laugh and then wave when he saw me. Then I saw his eyes flick over towards Camille and his smile faded a little. I had purposely left a seat for Logan at the end of our row, just because I knew that it would be awkward for Camille and Logan to sit anywhere near each other. And James…well, James was a flirt, so I knew that he would find his own seat and not care who he sat next to. (The girls may mind, but oh well, it was fun to watch.)

"Hey!" Stephanie, Jo, and Camille got to their feet and hugged the guys. I noticed that Logan and Camille hesitated for a second before hugging but did so, probably so they wouldn't look awkward to everyone else.

_Not that that worked very well._ I thought to myself, rolling my eyes.

"Hey guys, say 'hi' to the camera," Stephanie instructed as she brought her video camera up to her eye. "I promised Carlos I would tape the game so he could watch it over and over again."

"Ugh, don't tell me he's getting a big head like James." Logan teased, hitting his friend in the stomach.

"No, he said that he wanted to see how he checked people into the boards to see if he could get away with it," Stephanie explained. "So he could do it again the next game or something."

"Leave it to Carlos to want a video for something like that," Jo stated with a sly smile. "When most would want it for something else…" her voice trailed off and she laughed as I groaned and slapped my hands over my ears.

"Please, some of us who don't have boyfriends don't want to hear something like that," I stated, rolling my eyes. "I get enough of it at work." I added as I sat down in my seat, moving my bag off of Logan's seat.

"Boy troubles?" Logan questioned with an inquisitive eyebrow raise, something that he could only do.

"Not really," I muttered in reply, looking down at the ice. "I'm not even looking for a boyfriend; I just have to listen to crap like that all the time." I smiled a little. "It sucks especially when Charlie, the girl that you helped back at the club, is flaunting her many boyfriends around."

"I can see how that can be a problem," Logan remarked, leaning back in his seat, holding his hands under his armpits. "But I don't think it would make a difference, no guy is good for you."

"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked in a fake-hurt tone as I turned my own inquisitive eyebrow raise towards him.

"I'm just saying that whatever guy goes out with you has to be special," Logan replied calmly. He smiled a little. "He has to know that you're not a high maintenance person, you can be girly one minute and a tomboy the next, and he has to know not to hurt you."

I narrowed my eyes at him. "Did James tell you about Dak?" I questioned.

"Dak?" Logan looked interested as he sat up straight. "No, he didn't." His eyebrows moved together in a way that only Logan could. His facial expressions could hold a lot of emotions. Even the slightest twitch of an eyebrow could mean that he was mad at you; you usually had to be quick to catch it. "What about Dak?"

"It's nothing" I shook my head, turning back to the ice again. "Really."

I cheered loudly, along with the rest of the audience as the lights dimmed and the players moved off of the ice. Loud techno music blared over the speakers in the arena as the lights flashed and swirled around, amping up everyone's adrenaline for the game. We waited as the starters for the Pittsburg Penguins were called before the Minnesota Wild was called.

I cheered politely with my friends as the starters were called, goalie first, and then smiled in anticipation.

"_and last but not least, the newcomers, Center, #13 Kendall Knight and Right Wing, #14 Carlos Garcia!_"

Logan, James, Jo, Stephanie, Camille, and I screamed, cheered, and hollered as loud as we could when Kendall and Carlos skated out onto the ice, waving towards the audience. I grinned as I could hear the audience cheer approvingly, then again, it wouldn't surprise me if most of the people there were fans of when they were still in the band, but support was support and I was still happy for them.

Then the game started, Kendall moved to the middle of the ice, tightly holding onto his hockey stick, staring at the player across from him and reacted as soon as the puck dropped onto the ice. Kendall bashed the other guy in the face and moved the hockey puck across the ice. Carlos skated along behind him as he hit any player that headed for his friend.

Kendall spun on his skates, effectively moving the puck behind Carlos, freeing Carlos to knock two more players into the ground, ducking as a player jumped at him to check him into the boards. Carlos shot forward, towards the goal and Kendall passed him the puck. Carlos skated around the goal and took a shot, but it bounced out of the goalie's glove, then Kendall quickly scooped up the puck and shot it into the goal.

"Yes!" I cheered, leaping to my feet. "Whoo! Go Carlos! Go Kendall!"

"Yeah man, that's the way to do it!" Logan shouted. I turned to him and gave him a high-five in celebration before giving me a hug.

In my cheering, I noticed that Stephanie was cheering along with James, bouncing up and down as if she was on a trampoline. James looked the happiest that I had ever seen him in the past few days. I knew that it was because he was really excited for his friends and part of me wanted him to tell Kendall, Logan, and Carlos what was going on, because they were always the ones that would be able to help each other with their problems.

Jo, true to her word, actually looked bored. Sure, she was cheering along with us, but she also looked like she didn't really understand what had just happened. I couldn't be mad at her for it, she was awesome and Kendall really loved her so that's all that mattered.

But Camille, I don't know for sure, but she looked really unhappy.

I didn't think much about it then (hello, the hockey game) but thinking about it later, I knew that she wasn't happy.

But I wasn't sure if it was about being at the game, where it was freezing, or because of Logan.

* * *

**A/N: Next chapter goes more into Logan's and Katie's friendship and the next chapter has everyone there again. I hope you guys liked this chapter and have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. :)**

**-Riley  
**


	13. Dinner Gone Screwy

**Dinner Gone Screwy**

**

* * *

**"Are they going to come up for air anytime soon?" I questioned, looking at my watch impatiently. "If they don't hurry up we're not going to make our dinner reservation. I placed my hands on my hips and shook my head as I gazed at Jo and Kendall, who were so busy with themselves they probably hadn't realized that they had been making out for the past fifteen minutes after Kendall's hockey game.

Of course it started out as a congratulatory kiss after the Minnesota Wild won probably the most exciting hockey game ever, and now here we are fifteen minutes later.

If Kendall didn't propose to her soon I was going to punch him, seriously.

"You know I was wondering the same thing," Logan commented from beside me as he looked at his watch as well. "I thought they were bad when we were teenagers, but this is ridiculous." He moved his hand over his mouth and started to tap his foot.

Of course he was impatient, he was always the punctual one, and it didn't help that he actually got mad if we were late to something. I can't even tell you how many times that I have heard him rant and rave about how others perceive you if you're late to something.

"Always Mr. Punctual," Stephanie remarked, shaking her head. She, Carlos, James, and Camille were sitting down on the concrete wall outside of the hockey arena as Logan and I opted to stand up. I could tell by the looks on their faces that they were just as annoyed as I was.

Carlos, as immature as usual, was drawing on the ground with a stick, Stephanie was messing with a game on her phone, and Camille had her legs crossed and her arms resting on her knee, looking at the ground. James was texting someone on his phone and was looking concerned about something. I stored that information in the back of my head, to remind myself to ask him about it later.

"Ugh," I rolled my eyes again. "Would they hurry up? I'm hungry!" I started to whine like a little kid. I didn't care, I was starving and I didn't want to have to wait for

"Hey!" James appeared behind Kendall and Jo, putting his arm around their shoulders. "If you're done eating each other's faces, the rest of us are hungry." He slapped Kendall on the back. "Let's actually go and get something to eat."

Kendall and Jo laughed, they were never ones to be embarrassed when caught doing PDA (although I would be much happier without it). But, hey, they were in love and (even though I would never tell Kendall this) I was extremely jealous of that. When I started to like guys, as I was a major tomboy when I was younger, I always loved the idea of being in love and being able to marry someone and be with them for the rest of your life.

I felt that way with Dak. He was the only guy that I had ever dated (I dated a few) that actually made me feel like I was whole and that we were going to be there for each other forever. Well, I had quickly learned that that was not the case. After we broke up, I had often wondered why I even thought that he would be the one for me; he was a Popstar that had been chased by millions of girls and he decided to date me. I should have had a red flag warning go up as soon as he asked me out, but I was a girl and I liked him a lot, so I didn't think clearly.

'_Ugh, god, now I'm going to be thinking about him for the rest of the night_' I shook my head, trying to shake all thoughts of my ex-boyfriend away. I let out a breath and walked behind everybody as we tried to find a place to go eat some dinner.

"You ok, baby sister?" Kendall asked as he came up to my side and put his arm around my shoulders. "You seem kind of distracted."

I looked up and brushed my bangs out of my face, trying to think of the answer. James and Logan, who had heard what Kendall said, turning their heads to look at me, looked at each other with surprised expressions on their faces and then turned to face the front again.

"Yeah, I'm good." I replied and smiled up at him. "I was just thinking of all of the homework and projects that I have to do." I reached out and shoved Kendall on the arm. "You're lucky you ducked out of going to school, it would probably kill you, big bro." I teased.

"I don't doubt that." Kendall replied with a laugh of his own.

I beamed up at him.

It was like old times.

"So, what do you want to eat tonight?" Logan, as we strolled along the never-ending sidewalks with the bright lights and the never ending cars and honking horns. If I didn't live in LA so long I would probably really hate it here.

"What about Outback Steakhouse?" Stephanie suggested.

"That place has like a million calories in one piece of steak." Camille replied as she brushed her wavy hair behind her ears. "That's probably not a good idea." She smiled and shoved her a little. "Not unless you want to get a heart attack."

"Well that's what Logie is for," Jo stated with a warm smile. "If anyone chokes or has a heart attack, we can count on him to save our lives."

"If it's any of them," he jerked his thumb over to Kendall, James, and Carlos. "I'd probably let them die for all of the years of torture they put me through." He laughed as Carlos started to chase him around, trying to hit him.

"Oh, you know that you would be bored if we didn't drag you around everywhere" James stated with a grin as he put his arm around Logan's shoulders and gave him a noogie. Kendall and Carlos then reached out and started to tickle their friend, laughing hysterically as they shuffled around on the sidewalk as Logan tired to get away.

"Wow, just by looking at them you wouldn't think that they were all 23." Jo stated as she shook her head, a fond, loving smile on her face.

"Well except for Kendall and Carlos they haven't been around each other in a long time," Stephanie explained quietly. "And from what Carlos tells me, they're practically miserable when the other two aren't around them, even though they're having fun with being a part of the Minnesota Wild."

"So why is it that they've been acting like they aren't as close as they used to be?" Camille looked completely confused. But she looked hurt at the same time. Just by looking at her, I knew that she was thinking about hers and Logan's relationship and how it had gone south. I don't even know what happened there, but I did know that I needed to get Logan's side of the story before I could give her any sort of advice of what to do.

That was the only thing that I hated about being younger than them sometimes. It took me a while to like guys, so I didn't understand why they were so worried about them when they were so worried about guys liking them. Now I understood it perfectly and knew how badly she was hurt, as she had loved Logan for a long time, even before she knew it herself. It would explain why she had helped the guys with so many plans as we were growing up at the Palm Woods. Then we met Jo and Stephanie and our group of friends was complete.

"They've been so busy with their own thing," Stephanie looked at the sky. "They've been doing so much to try and hide the fact that they've been missing each other and it kind of backfired in their faces." She shrugged.

"Or it caused them to notice things that they hadn't seen before." I muttered to myself, thinking back to the conversation that James and I had before.

_"I dunno. It's just this place seems so… I don't know how to really describe it." James sighed and then turned towards me, smiling a little. "Keep a secret?" he questioned._

_"Of course," I replied as I crossed an 'x' over my heart to show how serious I was._

_"Secretly," James turned back towards the ocean, staring at it as if it was going to change. "I don't like it here…." He paused. "At least; not as much as I used to."_

_"But, we grew up here." I tore my gaze from the black water to him. "Kind of. Your band grew up here; your guys' friendship grew even stronger while you were here."_

_"I know." James replied as he scratched his forehead. "But it's just that it feels like this town is against me. All of these people that just want me to fail; the ones that are constantly following me around and trying to make me break." He rubbed his nose. "Did you know that they called my mom back home and told her that I said so many awful things about her?"_

_"No way!" I cried in shock. "That's so mean and stupid!"_

_"I know," James laughed bitterly. "She didn't believe it, because she and I have this special connection." He laughed. "I'm kind of embarrassed about it, but its coll." He frowned. "It was things like that that made me want to get away from here." He fell silent again and I turned my eyes to the water again. We stayed silent for a long time. "Are you going to come with me?"_

"What was that, Katie?"

I looked up and noticed the girls were staring at me. I smiled and shook my head. "Nothing."

"Anyway," Logan pushed his friends away, his hair tousled. "Dinner? Where are we going?" he was still laughing a little. It was probably the happiest that I have seen the guys in a long time.

I opened my mouth to reply. "I-"

Carlos cut in. "I want to eat Japanese food! Let's go to Yoshinova!" he squealed excitedly, naming a famous Japanese restaurant.

Unfortunately, it also happened to be located in the opposite direction of the hockey arena (which we just left from), and I really didn't want to make such a long trip just to eat Japanese food. My feet were sore and aching from a long game of being on my feet and shouting at people, and I just wanted to eat and ditch the place.

"But it's so far away," I argued. "Besides, we never eat anything else whenever we come here."

Carlos looked ready to cry, causing the rest of us to laugh "But I want to eat Japanese food!" he insisted, even stomping his foot for greater effect.

Sheesh.

And he turns 24 next month.

But that's Carlos, he liked to get his way, and he liked to make everyone laugh. So the only way that he could get that to happen was if he acted as if he was going to get a temper tantrum for not getting his way. As annoying as that could be it was also endearing. (At least from what Stephanie has told me.)

"Oh, come on, Kates," Logan put his arm around my shoulders and rubbed them gently. "We don't want Carlos to have to go into his 'wounded-puppy-dog-mode' do ya?" He laughed as I made a face at the thought and pulled his arm away from me. Suddenly I felt cold. "I didn't think so."

"Well, what about Genki Sushi?" Kendall compromised. "It's closer to the car park, and it's still Japanese food," He looked over at me. "Besides, I'm sure that Katie's probably a little sore and tired after having screamed and shouted all game."

That was my brother, always knowing when something was bothering me.

"What do you think, Carlos?" James asked him with a warm smile.

Carlos made a show of pouting and thinking it over, then heaved a huge fake sigh and mumbled, "Yeah, I guess that's okay." Before smiling and becoming all hyper again.

I wanted to throttle him.

Thank goodness for self-control.

We sauntered on over to the restaurant in question, and took our seats right in front of the conveyor belt. Each of us grabbed a few plates of sushi from the belt as the dishes meandered past us. I tried to ignore the fact that Logan had immediately tensed up when he realized that Camille was sitting on his other side. (If I had to guess, it would have been an obvious plan of Jo and Stephanie to get them to talk.)

As usual, the sushi was delicious, but the small servings weren't really filling us up any, so Kendall decided to order some more food. He scanned the menu carefully, and then asked us, "What else would you like to eat?" He paused and leaned over to look at Carlos. "Besides you, I mean."

"Why besides me?" He looked slightly offended, although he was grinning.

"Because you've already eaten practically everything that was on the conveyer belt," James pointed out, motioning to the many empty plastic boxes in front of him. "Save some for the rest of us."

Carlos just stuck out his tongue. "Hey, don't worry about it." Stephanie smiled and lovingly ran her fingers over Carlos' cheek. (Gross, but I couldn't help but smile anyway.) "I like it better when you're full; it makes your cuddlier." She smiled and wrapped her arms around Carlos in a tight hug.

"Can we please not talk about your sex life?" Jo joked, tossing a napkin at them.

"Can we please not talk about sex at all?" I questioned, slapping my hands over my ears.

"So, food," Logan stated in a high-pitched voice. He always did that when he was uncomfortable. He had grabbed the menu from Kendall and held it over his now flaming face. "What else do you guys want?"

"Teriyaki chicken," I answered immediately. Teriyaki chicken was a special favorite of mine; I ordered it every time I went to a Japanese restaurant.

"Do you want rice with that?"

Despite what I had said about the sushi not being filling, apparently I didn't have much stomach space either. "No thanks, just the chicken."

"I want rice with the chicken!" James commented from my other side, reaching across my face and pointing at the menu. I made a face and pushed his arm away.

'_Wow_, _his muscles have gotten bigger_' I thought to myself for a second and then slapped myself on the forehead, shaking my head as well. Thankfully neither of the guys noticed.

"You want rice?" Logan looked at the menu and then nodded, putting it aside. "Okay then, I'll order a teriyaki chicken set, and you two can share."

I frowned in indignation. "The set has a lot of rice and other stuff that we don't eat anyway!"

Logan shrugged. "Well, James wants rice with his chicken."

"So why can't you just order another bowl of rice or something?"

"Because it's easier this way. Now be quiet, I'm going to order." Logan shushed me impatiently as he beckoned to the waiter, and I resumed eating my sushi quietly. James shot me a triumphant grin, and I did my best to ignore him, although I was smiling a little myself. Logan turned and shot me a smile himself, just to show that he was kidding.

_'Well, James is going to be the one who'll be putting on weight',_ I thought, stabbing viciously at the poor sushi with my lethal wooden chopsticks. Did you know rice contains thousands of kilojoules? Logan probably did, but I'm guessing that James didn't know. Not that would matter, knowing James he was going to head to the gym later tonight or early tomorrow anyway. Besides the chicken, we had ordered some tofu, too. (Jo and Camille were going to eat it; the rest of us hated that stuff.)

"So, what are you doing in college right now?" Logan asked as he put down his fork and knife, carefully chewing on his piece of steak 30 times before swallowing it, picking up his utensils, and cutting another piece. He was the only one that had ordered steak and of course, he was the only person that would follow the rule of chewing everything a certain amount of times before swallowing it.

I can't remember how many times mom had tried to get Kendall and me to eat slower to have better digestion. But, hey, we didn't care; we just loved the food so much that we couldn't get enough of it. I also knew that Mom missed it so much that she got weepy at the thought of us coming home for dinner. She couldn't get to the hockey game because of work, but I knew that Kendall was going to visit her the next day before he and Carlos had to leave again.

"Right now I'm studying to be a lawyer," I replied as I picked up my cup of water and took a sip. Ice hit my teeth and a little bit of pain shot up my body as they immediately went cold. "Along with taking other core classes just to get them out of the way."

"_Really_!" Logan looked completely ecstatic. "That's great! You could probably make a lot of money as a lawyer and I know you'd be really great with it." He beamed as he put down his fork and knife again. "So, what type of lawyer are you thinking of being? Like, a patent lawyer? Or, like, one that deals with copyrights..."

"Actuuaallly…" I held the world out and laughed a little bit. "I was just thinking about being a lawyer in civil cases."

"That's really cool." Logan smiled.

"Yeah…" I agreed with myself as she nodded. "How about you? How's the doctoring and stuff going?"

"Well, it's going really well," Logan seemed hesitant, I noticed it immediately. "I've gotten a lot of work done and a lot of hands on stuff. I mean, I even got to help with a surgery on someone. But," he paused. "I've been told of some better opportunities in New York."

"New York?" I wrinkled my nose. "You mean you're moving?"

"I don't know," Logan replied as he shrugged. "I don't know if it will be good for me, I mean, I've never really visited there except for the few times we did a show there when we were still Big Time Rush." He looked sad for a moment, but then it passed. "And I don't know if I would want to leave you guys again." He looked directly into my eyes when he said that.

I looked at Camille over his shoulder and suddenly felt a little guilty.

I looked away from Camille and avoided Logan's gaze.

"Well, if you decide to leave you know that all of us would respect your decision." I picked up my chopsticks as mine and James' food came out. "But that doesn't mean that Carlos won't hunt you down and kill you for leaving him again."

I stabbed a piece of chicken and shoved it into my mouth.

* * *

**A/N: There a longer chapter for you guys and they're just going to get longer as the story continues to move on. I already have an idea for the rest of the story and quite possibly a sequel. I don't know it depends on how I leave off the end of the story. Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed it and I'll update again soon.**


	14. Awkward

**Awkward**

* * *

Dak twirled his pencil around his finger as he looked around the room, zoning out and not paying any attention of what the English professor was droning on and on about. Every time he caught a girl's eye, they would flutter their eyelashes at him and give a finger-wave, while occasionally flipping their hair. But not Katie.

Definitely not Katie.

She had her head down and was dutifully writing down notes, occasionally pulling her hair behind her ear. He remembered how much he liked to watch her when she was busy with something, because anything she was doing she had a smile while doing it, but now, it just made him feel guilty.

And it was his fault, he supposed.

But he also blamed his record company and the paparazzi at the same time.

When he and Katie I were together, there was so much tension between them, that he couldn't stand it anymore. But the tension was his fault; he didn't pay a lot of attention to what Katie was doing, since he spent hours upon hours working on music. There was also so much pressure on him from the Paparazzi, the people that worked at the record company, and from Katie's brother and friends that he had to break off the relationship. He couldn't stand the pressure he had. It was if two metal plates were crushing his head as if two cars collided into it. So, before the cars hit, he ducked out of the way, and he broke it off.

He tried everything to catch her attention, but it didn't seem to work.

He had thought about giving up, but then what the teacher had said about a small project that was going to be due the next day caught his attention. Apparently she had been assigning groups together and as luck would have it, he was going to be partnered with Katie.

She looked up as her name was called and then her eyes slid over to Dak, barely concealing the disgust that she held.

'_Well, at least she'll have to talk to me now_' Dak thought as he gathered up his books along with the other students and moved seats so he was sitting across from her.

Katie's mind whirled as her eyes prickled again.

'_Ugh, normally, I don't cry. I can't. I always refused to cry when I was younger. I didn't want people to find out they could hurt me. I didn't want to be this vulnerable._' Katie thought to herself, rubbing her hands over her face._ 'Look, you made me cry. For the first time in months. Because of you, I'm crying. Congratulations, you made the girl who couldn't cry, cry_.'

"Are-are you ok?" Dak reached a hand out to touch her arm and Katie quickly pulled it away.

"You don't deserve to care how I feel." Katie whispered back, making sure that no one could hear her.

"I know," Dak scratched his forehead. "I know I shouldn't, but I can't help it. I don't want you to be sad." He made a face as he winced; realizing that what he had just said was stupid.

Katie's eyes filled with fury and she crossed her arms on the table and slightly leaned closer. Close enough so that he could hear what she was saying and know that she meant everything that she said and that she was serious when her eyes said that she hated him.

"You left me. You used me. When you have something YOU want to talk about, I'm good enough. Otherwise, I'm not. I can't help the fact that I don't like being with a lot of people. That the thought almost makes me throw up. This is not fair. Not at all. I've always been there for you. Always. When you needed me, I was there. I guess it doesn't work the other way around. Thank you so much, congratulations, you broke my heart." Katie hissed and got up, grabbing her backpack.

"Katie!" Dak stood up as well, ignoring everyone else' stares. "Katie, wait! Katie!" He called after her.

"Mr. Zevon," the professor called his name and he turned towards her. "Would you please go after her and see if she's ok?"

"No, it's better if she's by herself for now." Dak replied, shaking his head and sat back down in his seat, crossing his arms over his chest.

Katie hurried out of the classroom and ran out of the building, only stopping when she finally made it outside. She tossed her bag to the ground and slid to the ground, resting her back against the concrete behind her. She shoved her hand into her pocket, searching for her cell phone and when she didn't feel it she started to through her backpack, finally finding it in the mesh pocket on the side. The first person she thought of calling was James and immediately dialed his number.

Katie put her phone to my ear and waited, listening as it ran over and over again. When it was evident that James wasn't going to pick up, she ended the call and then scrolled through her list again. She left Kendall a message and then tried to decide whether or not to call Carlos or Logan. Carlos probably wouldn't really know what to do about it but try and make her smile…Well, she could use that. So she called him and left him a message as well before calling Logan.

The two probably would be able to talk to each other openly about it; Logan was probably the most upset that she and Dak broke up. He was the one that said that he could see the two of them together for a long time. Katie frowned and felt a little guilty as she looked back at the classroom. She knew that ditching Dak would be very rude and would show him that she was a better person, but she still felt awkward around him and he deserved it. Besides, Katie still wanted to why he and Camille broke up.

Four rings went by and she was about to hang up, but then she heard Logan's voice on the phone.

"Hey Katie, what's up?" he asked and then sounded concerned when Katie didn't answer right away. "Katie? Are you there?"

"Yeah," Katie replied after a second. "Yeah, I'm here." She let out a breath. "Can you come get me?"

"I'm in the middle of a class right now," Logan replied, sounding rushed. She could practically see him looking at his watch repeatedly. "I had to step out when you called me."

"Oh sorry, I didn't mean to…" Katie trailed off her sentence and Logan could hear the distress in her voice.

"I can be there in twenty minutes." He stated.

"I don't want you to skip your class, Logan." Katie insisted, shaking her head, even though he couldn't see her. "Just go back, I'll be fine."

"No way," Logan replied and she could hear him gathering his stuff together. "I'll just tell my teacher that there was some sort of an emergency-"

"But you can't lie," Katie pointed out, hearing a beep in her ear. She pulled her phone away and saw that she had just gotten a voicemail. "You always make these stupid sounds, your eyes grow wide, you start to sweat, and then you blurt out the truth."

"I'll handle it." Logan replied and hung up.

Katie smiled a little as she ended the call and then went to check her voicemail. She saw that she had three messages and listened to them, her eyes shifting back and forth, and her thumbnail in her mouth.

"_Hey Baby Sister, it's me. I can't talk right now because Carlos and I are getting ready to get on a plane, but I'll call you as soon as I land. The only thing I really want to know is whose ass am I kicking? Later."_

_"Hey Katie, its Carlos. I can tell by the sound of your voice that you need a hug. And unfortunately I can't give you one right now, but the next time I see you, which better be soon, I'll give you the biggest hug you've ever had."_

_"Hey its James, you sound really upset. Do you need me to pick you up or anything? I'm taking a break from shooting soon so if you call back I can talk. Later."_

Katie smiled as she hung up her phone.

* * *

**A/N: So I wanted to show a little bit of Dak's thoughts on the breakup and a little bit more of Katie's. The next chapter has more to do with the Logan/Katie/James deal and something really dramatic will happen. Bet you can't guess. I'll update again soon.**

**-Riley**


	15. Oh No

**Oh No**

**

* * *

**I continued to sit outside of the building, randomly looking at websites on my phone as I waited for Logan to pick me up. Whenever someone would pass me and look at me and start to whisper, I would think back to the classroom and start to tear up again.

Ugh, I hated crying.

I especially hated crying over Dak, I mean, sure he was my first boyfriend, and sure I loved him, and sure I was hurt when he broke up with me, but still I was completely over him and had been for a while, so I don't understand why it was still hurting me so bad.

But Logan was one of my friends; he was like, my brother, but not.

So I knew that he would be able to make me feel better.

"Hey."

I looked up quickly, barely able to conceal my gasp. My eyes are wide, red, and watery. I immediately reach up my shirtsleeves to wipe the errant tears away. I didn't even hear Logan pull up; I didn't know that he had gotten out of his car until he was standing right above him, hands in his pockets, wearing his usual sweater vest over a button down shirt and jeans.

I'm sure he is probably the only person in the world that could pull that off without making it look too geeky. (And that's saying something.)

"Hey." I said, managing a small smile. Logan returns my smile, but I could see the concern in his eyes. He was always able to give away his emotions through his eyes and through his mannerisms. Logan raised his eyebrows as he looked down at the spot next to me, silently asking if he could sit.

I nod and pat the space next to me.

He sits.

"You want?" He asks, pulling out a lollipop. I raised an eyebrow as I turned and looked at him.

"Seriously?" I questioned with a short nod of disbelief. "A lollipop?"

"Hey, you sounded sad on the phone," Logan replied, crossing his arms over his knees. "And lollipops always make people feel better." He added with a grin. I smiled and took one from him, unwrapping the candy and sticking it in my mouth.

I watch as Logan unwrapped his lollipop and stuck it into his mouth, moving it to one side as he sucked on the piece of candy. I looked away, smiling a little.

A light silence falls between us, neither of us speaking, but it was comfortable. Not in the way that James and I had silences, they were comfortable too, but I felt that this one was different. Comfortable in a different way.

"So, what's wrong?" Logan asked, rubbing his hands on his jeans.

"Wha-what do you mean? I'm fine." I lied quickly, faking a small smile.

"Yeah," Logan nodded once. "And my dad's Albert Einstein ." He looks over at me with a bit of a smile. Logan cleared his throat and spoke again, his voice tender. "When I walked up here, you were crying. And I could hear a hint of you sound like you were going to cry on the phone. What's wrong?"

"It-it's nothing. No worries." I lie.

Again.

I hate lying to him; he could always tell whenever someone lied. (Especially Carlos, because he is a _horrible_ liar.) At that moment I wanted nothing more than for my brother to be here to take me in his arms and let me cry until the tears won't come. The same way he did when we were younger and I hurt myself or when I would think about how our dad had left us.

But sitting in silence with Logan almost helped as much. We sit for a few more moments, no words between us. He just stretched his legs out and looks at me. "Well...?" he prompted gently.

"Nothing. Nothing..." I replied, sadly. I look into his chocolate brown eyes and feel my floodgates opening, tears springing to my eyes. "It's... it's..." He moves towards me, holding me in his arms. "It's just life, I guess. School, friends, family. It just all kind of came to a breaking point, I guess. Seeing Dak around all the time is getting to break me down, and having everyone associate me with you guys or just being 'Kendall Knight's little sister'. I just... I can't do anything right anymore. There's no point in trying." I say, breathing shakily. His arms are still around me, comforting me. At first he says nothing, just holds me.

Let's me take out my anger, my frustrations at life.

"I'm sorry, Kates. I really am." He finally says. I could hear the sincerity in his voice "But it'll get better, I promise you. It will..."

"I-I know. I'm sorry for dropping all this on your shoulders."

"Don't." Logan smiled and rubbed my shoulder. "What are friends for?"

"Thanks..." I moved my hair out of my face and wiped the tears away. I was finally done crying. Suddenly, suspicion slid over me when I remembered what he had dropped to come get me. "One question, though." Logan nodded, prompting me to continue. I punched him on the arm. "WHY would you drop your doctor classes to come get me?" I ask with a smile, curiosity getting the best of me. "You're on the other side of town."

"I just needed some air, I guess." He says with a shrug. I give him an odd look and he exhales sharply. "Okay, okay. I was hoping that I'd be able to make you feel better." He smiled again. "Some things are more important than classes." I continued to stare at him. "Alright, I told my professor that I would do an extra credit paper since I was leaving early."

"I knew it." I teased.

"Anyway," Logan got up and jiggled his keys. "I'm going to take you out to have fun, so you don't have to think about Dak."

"You?" I snorted. "Being fun?"

"I have my moments." Logan replied.

* * *

Logan and I _did_ have a lot of fun. We went to the beach, to the fair, to the park and to the bookstore. Now, I know that a lot of people wouldn't have fun in the bookstore, but I did. Logan, although he was completely against it at first, but he helped me move some books from their places (by genre) and put them in other completely wrong places. I've always wanted to mess with the worker's heads, so this was definitely the best time to do it. Then we talked over cups of hot chocolate, reminiscing about everything that had happened with us at the Palm Woods, laughing until our sides hurt. Then we read to each other.

Yeah, I know that sounds odd.

But we picked out children's books and read to each other, making up voices and making faces as we went along. (We even picked out a Let's Find Pokémon! book and had a competition to see who could find the most Pokémon first.)

I can honestly say that it was probably one of the best days of my life.

I had so much fun it's not even funny.

Logan had even decided to drive me home, so I could talk some things over with my mom (she's a really great person to talk to whenever something is really bothering you, although she can baby me sometimes, not that I don't mind it) and I was surprised to see James sitting on the front porch.

"Hey" Logan waved and grinned as he got out of the car.

"Hey dude," James greeted, smiling back as I got out of the car as well, pulling my hair behind my ears. Logan strode up to his friend and they grabbed each other in a hug, rocking back and forth and talking excitedly at the same time.

If I didn't know any better, I would have said that they didn't have dinner together just last week. But hey, I guess guys could be as happy to see each other as girls are.

"What are you doing here?" Logan asked shoving his hands into his pockets as I (slowly) made my way up to the two of them.

I didn't know why, but something was telling me to give them some space for a few minutes. That and I was afraid of listening to something that I didn't want to hear that could have happened while James was on set. I knew of many stories where the stars and co-stars and extras of movies got into a lot of trouble *coughdrinkingdrugssexcough* just to keep their names in the headlines for their movies.

"Oh I had gotten Katie's voicemail and I came by to see if she was ok," James replied, smiling over at me. I gave a small one back. "I went to your school first and some of your friends said that you left early." He then turned back to Logan. "I didn't know you had gotten her."

"Yeah," Logan shrugged. "I wasn't really doing anything that important," he shrugged again. Kind of nervously. "And I knew that she would have called all of you guys, and I figured that you would have been busy filming or something."

"I got a break." James replied.

"That's cool." Logan replied with a smile.

"Yeah."

I looked back and forth between James and Logan. The two of them were talking to each other animatedly, but they had odd expressions on their faces and in their eyes. It was like they were trying to compete each other for something. The last time that I had ever seen that look was when they were playing hockey with each other.

But this time we were standing in the foyer of my house, with no ice around and…

Oh no.

* * *

**A/N: Ok, next few chapters time is going to fly by, because this has happened in only a couple of weeks, you know what, I really don't know because I don't really do a great job of keeping track of time when I write stories. (Which I probably should.) :) Anyway, this is the beginning of the Logan/Katie/James love triangle and its going to get even more dramatic, longer, and steamy, *winkwink* as the chapters move on. I'll update again soon.**

**-Riley**


	16. James: Attention

**James: Attention**

**

* * *

**For the past few weeks, almost a month, James and Logan had been taking over my attention, as well as school and work. Hanging out with the two is really fun and it takes my mind off of things whenever it gets too stressful. I've had to work a lot more lately and although I do love working there, it can be a drag, especially when I have so much school work to complete as well. Add in the fact that Dak is in most of my classes and constantly tries to get my attention (for what reason I don't know) it's not helping much. But I enjoy the times I get to spend with Logan and James, they act like they did when we were still at the Palm Woods and it's a welcome change.

With James we go and actually do stuff, play soccer, go to the movies, go to the mall. But with Logan I can talk about anything that's bothering me, and it helped me realize some things that I didn't even know were bothering me in the first place. Sometimes all three of us hang out together, when James and Logan both have the same time off, but usually it's just me with the one of them.

But of course, there are times where I don't want to hang out with them so I hang out with the girls, Jo, Camille, and Stephanie I mean. They included me on whatever they did when we were younger, and I'm glad that they still do that. Besides Charlie and Sarah, those girls are the only real 'girl friends' that I have and knowing them for a long time has really helped me.

I don't know why, but they had been commenting on all of the time that I've been spending with James and Logan lately. They think it's odd, but I don't, not whatsoever.

I mean, they're the only ones I can really talk to while Kendall is away.

So what's the problem with that?

* * *

"Hey, how was work today?" James questioned as he leaned over to push open the car door for me. I smiled as I got in and pulled it shut, before pulling the seatbelt over my chest and buckling up. James looked over his shoulder before pulling away from the restaurant. "Better or worse than yesterday?"

"Better I guess," I replied, pulling my hair up into a ponytail, wincing as the smell of fish hit my nose. "There wasn't as much people, that came in this time, but it still was enough that I didn't get a lot of my work done while I was there." I laughed a little as I thought about something really funny that happened at work. "Want to hear a funny story?"

"Of course," James replied as he pulled up to a red light. I watched, rolling my eyes as James looked into the rearview mirror and started to fix his hair. He did that each and _every_ time he was anywhere near a mirror. It was annoying, but it's what made James James and I doubted that it would change any time soon. "I'm always up for a good story." He stated, shooting a grin towards me.

"Ok, so, we were working and there was a lull," I explained, putting my feet up and resting them on the dashboard. "Long enough for me to get most of my work done, but anyway. I was doing some homework and all of a sudden I hear Jacob, Charlie, and Sarah cracking up. So being me, of course I had to go and see what was going on."

"Of course" James agreed, smirking a little as the light turned green and he started driving again.

"Are you messing with me?" I demanded, reaching out to shove his shoulder.

"Yes," James replied as he grabbed my hand and easily pushed my arm away. "Yes I am, and the only reason I do it is because you make it _way_ too easy." He stuck his tongue out at me, from the corner of his mouth, and let go of my hand. "Go on, what were you saying?"

"Anyway, I go back to the kitchen to see what's going on," I continued as I moved my hand back to my lap. "There, I see Charlie, Sarah, Jacob, and the cooks all standing around the microwave, laughing at it. I thought that it was weird and walked over to see what was going on." I grinned as I got the best part of the story. "Jacob sees me and drags me over and I see the BIGGEST cockroach I have ever seen in the microwave, running around and around. They were trying to microwave it to see if it was true that cockroaches were hard to destroy."

"Cool." James grinned.

"Turns out, they are," I replied, still a little disappointed. "But after that, I went and found a spider," I've never been afraid of them. "Then we put it into the microwave and started to cook that." James burst out laughing before I even finished my story. "It completely blew up after about fifteen seconds and the guys and blood went flying everywhere. It was so cool!"

"Dude, I wonder why we never thought of doing that," James stated, shaking his head as he turned the wheel sharply. He made a sound of apology as I smacked my head into the window. "It definitely would have taken up some of the times when we were really bored."

"Or some of the times when you guys were getting yelled at over and over again by Gustavo." I replied as an afterthought. "I haven't heard much from him lately."

"That's a funny story," James commented as he pulled up into the parking lot and turned off the car. "Kelly called recently and said that he's thinking of taking a break from music for a while, because he feels that after our band left that there wasn't going to be a band as good as ours that he could work with." I looked at him with a skeptical eyebrow raise. "Ok, Gustavo never wanted to admit that to us, so he just said it to Kelly, thinking she wouldn't tell us."

"That sounds more like Gustavo." I stated as I got out of the car, leaving my backpack and my purse on the floor, smiling as the salty air blew my hair out of my face. James and I always went to the beach before we actually figured out what we wanted to do while hanging out.

Well, we sat on the pier and talked for hours to be more exact.

"Alright, are you ready to go?" James asked, getting my attention as I turned away from the water. I smiled a little. "What?" James questioned, self-consciously as he pushed his glasses up his nose. "My contacts were bothering me." He explained.

"Don't worry," I waved a hand as I started to walk down on to the sand, hopping up and down as I pulled off my socks as shoes as I went. "It makes you look _much_ smarter."

"Thanks." James replied sarcastically.

I laughed as I ran ahead of him onto the sand, tossing my shoes aside. I could hear James' foot steps behind me as I quickly moved across the sand, kicking it up into the air, and holding my arms out as I spun in a circle. I loved the beach; it was one of my favorite places to go. No matter how many times we went to the beach I never got tired of it.

"A little excitable today, are we?" James asked and I looked at him oddly and smiled a little. His eyes suddenly widened and he waved his hands back and forth rapidly. "That's not what I meant!" he cried, laughing at his mistake. "I didn't mean that at all!" Apparently I wasn't the only one that took what he said the wrong way.

But the way that he was freaking out about it was funny. "James, relax, I'm not offended at all." I stated, laughing a little. "Besides, you're forgetting that I'm not Kendall's little sister who doesn't know anything about the world." I placed my hands on my hips. "I'm not a little girl anymore."

"Trust me," James stated as he placed one hand on his hips and used the other to pull his hair out of his face. "I've noticed." He cleared his throat and shielded his face as the wind blew even harder. I turned around and looked up at the sky, smiling when I noticed that some people were flying kites. "Anyway, do you want to go get some ice cream and talk?"

"Of course," I replied as I turned and smiled back at him.

Ice Cream and the Pier, some of my new two favorite things.

"The usual?" James asked and I nodded back.

* * *

"So, how was your weekend?" James questioned as he took a spoonful of his ice cream from his bowl. We had been talking there for a few hours, about everything randomly, and now he was asking me about my weekend.

Kind of weird, but whatever.

"It was fine," I shrugged, swallowing a lick of my ice cream cone. "Logan and I went to the mall and made fun of the mannequins that they have in the shop windows." I smiled at the thought. "We even went into Spencer's and bought lots of feather boas and put them around the mannequins before the security could catch us."

"Logan Mitchell?" James asked, sounding surprised and…well, I couldn't put my finger on it. "No way would Logan do that?"

"He did," I nodded, trying to defend him. "He said that the weekends are for being spontaneous and that was spontaneous enough for him." I laughed. "How was your weekend? Did you finish filming?"

"Yeah," James nodded. "The movie is over and the premiere is going to be in a few months." He took another bite of ice cream and shuddered as he got a brain freeze. "It should be really cool." He finished his ice cream and wiped his hands on his pants. "I don't know if I'm going to stay here though."

"Really?" I nearly choked on my own ice cream.

_"Secretly," James turned back towards the ocean, staring at it as if it was going to change. "I don't like it here…." He paused. "At least, not as much as I used to."_

"That's funny," I nodded once. "Logan is thinking of leaving too. He said that he may move to New York." I looked over at James and saw that he looked surprised and hurt. "He didn't tell you." I knew it, I didn't have to ask.

"No," James shook his head. "He didn't. I bet Kendall and Carlos don't know either." He frowned. "I don't get why he wouldn't tell us at all, if you've known for a while. I mean," he shrugged. "I've told the three of them how I don't really want to be here anymore and they've been trying to help me get through it. But…I don't know, I guess Logan has always been kind of a loner with his feelings. He doesn't express them as much."

I nodded silently.

Tossing my ice cream cone aside, I stood up and walked off of the pier, not saying anything as I headed onto the beach again. The nice blue sky had turned grey as storm clouds rolled in. I loved the look of it; I was also probably one of the only people that liked the idea of being caught in a rain storm. I loved to watch the rain. On many rainy days back in Minnesota when the guys would be playing video games or something, I would just sit on the couch and watch the rain fall. It was relaxing; it was a mystery in a way.

The wind blew my hair forward; it lashed around in my eyes as the air around me buzzed with the imminent threat of a rainstorm. The calm water had turned into whitecaps a few hours earlier, and had since turned into rather decent-sized waves.

I turned and climbed up, to stand on pilings by the pier. James came to join me. They protruded about 4 feet out of the sandy beach, and with a little climbing and balancing skills, we were able to climb to the top of them and just stand there, embracing the wind. It felt wonderful. I'd been doing it for years, but this was the first time the weather had been like this in a while.

"This makes me see the beach in a different way," James said. "I'd always be upset dur…" he stuttered as she lost her balance for a second, "…during vacations when there was bad weather, but this is amazing."

"Most people see the beach as a sunny resort," I said, carefully turning around so the wind would blow my hair out of my face instead of in it. "But this…this is how I see it; empty, cool, and still a paradise in its own way."

"Amazing…" he whispered, just loud enough for me to hear. His arms were stretched out like he was flying, his eyes were closed, and there was a smile across his face that spoke louder and more clearly than anything he could say. "Marry me," He said without opening his eyes.

I laughed. "Sure thing," I replied, and turned to face him. "When?"

"Right now," He replied, finally opening his eyes. "The world is ours right now. The City is ours." He grinned at the little pun. "Can't you feel it?"

I suddenly lost my balance and fell. James started laughing and ended up losing his balance as well. He landed not a foot away from me. I rolled over a bit and faced him, after briefly looking at my watch. "Can you take me back to the campus? I have homework and laundry to get done."

"Sure thing," James replied as he stood up and brushed the sand off of his pants. I held out my hands and he grabbed them gently and pulled me to my feet. "Glad you could spend the afternoon with me, I was getting bored."

"Good, I saved you from your boredom then. Wouldn't want you to die," I replied and lightly hit him on the arm. "But next time it'll cost you, about twenty bucks."

"I'm not surprised." James replied. We walked back to grab our shoes and then go back into his car and he drove me back to the campus. We drove the whole way back in a comfortable silence, we didn't need to talk, and it wasn't awkward at all. "Here we are."

"Thanks." I stated and started to gather my stuff together.

"Hey," I stopped moving and looked at James; he was looking back at me with a serious expression on his face. "Thanks for listening today. About everything that I probably bothered you about."

"No problem." I replied.

Then James leaned over and gently kissed my cheek, before sitting up and tightening his grip on the steering wheel. "I'll see you later?" he shrugged, avoiding my gaze. "Just give me a call whenever you're free."

"Sure thing." I replied and got out of the car, ducking to make sure I didn't hit my head as I got out. I slammed the door shut behind me and took a step back, waving as James pulled away and drove out of sight.

Then I turned and walked back into the school…grinning like an idiot…

* * *

**A/N: Yes, James DOES wear contacts in real life, so that means that he'll (most likely) wear contacts as well. Aww, there was a little kiss there. The story is heating up. I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter and I'll update again soon. Sorry that these chapters are a little short, I'm working on making them longer.**

**-Riley**


	17. Logan: Attention

**Logan: Attention**

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**"So we can go to the zoo or whatever after I get a book from the library," I said to Logan as I got into his car and closed the door. "Sorry, but I really need to get this book for my class and I didn't realize it until a couple of hours ago."

"It's no problem," Logan replied and looked at his phone as it rang suddenly. He looked at the ID and frowned before pushing ignore and setting it back down. He grabbed onto the wheel and looked over his shoulder as he backed out of his parking spot.

I looked at the campus as we drove away from it and thought that it was ironic, before I hated to have to leave the campus because I thought that it was the greatest place on earth, being away from home for the first time, but lately I've wanted to stay away from it more and more. But I didn't know if it was because I enjoyed the time I spent with Logan and James, the fact that I didn't have to see Dak practically everywhere I went, the fact that everyone was always gossiping about me _because _I spent so much time with Logan and James while my ex was at my college, or a combination of everything along with the world going crazy.

"Who was it?" I questioned as we drove on in comfortable silence.

"Who was who?" Logan asked, briefly looking away from the road to look at me. "Feet down," he said and reached out and pushed my feet down from the dashboard (like he always did).

"Who was that on the phone?" I replied and nodded to it. "When you ignored the call?" I didn't have to ask him, I knew that it was Camille and I knew that things were still really awkward between them even though they claimed that they were just friends.

"It was just someone from my class," Logan replied with a shrug. "No big deal, I think he-"

"Do you want to tell me the truth?" I interrupted, not wanting to hear about it. Logan just stayed silent. That was alright, I knew that I would get it out of him eventually. Logan pulled up to the library and we strolled inside and went up to the second floor, where the computers are, I headed over to the computers so I could see if the book I was looking for was in the library.

I searched through the computer and quickly found the book that I was looking for. When I was done, I looked up to see that Logan had wandered to the other side of the room and was sitting on the window seat, looking over the parking lot and the parking lot and the accompanying sights. The library here was probably the biggest library in the city, being three stories high, complete with a coffee shop downstairs and several empty ballrooms where a concert was held occasionally. We were on the second floor, so we had a somewhat wide view of the skyscrapers surrounding us.

I walked over to him and looked out the window as well, running my fingers through my hair and then frowned. My messily-done ponytail was even more messed up, so I pulled the elastic back from my hair. Dark brown hair tumbled down my shoulders, ending at the middle of my back.

"Nice." Logan commented as he looked over at me, examining how my layered hair framed my face.

"Really?" I questioned, pausing with my hands twisted in my hair, getting ready to tie it back up. Logan smiled a crooked smile and then nodded.

"Yep. You should let your hair down more, Katie." He commented as he moved to make space on the window seat so I could sit down as well. "Every time I see you, it's always tied up." He tilted his head to the side. "Since when did you let your hair down?"

"Since now," I replied in a mock-annoyed tone as I placed my hands on my hips and rolled my neck. "Do you have a problem with that?"

"Nah…" He grinned. "It makes you look pretty"

I smiled back, slightly self-conscious as I moved my hair away from my face. I looked over at him then and realized that he hadn't smiled a lot lately, maybe due to the stress of how much he was working on his classes, but he definitely needed to smile more. It made him even more attractive than he already was.

'_What?_' I asked myself, shaking my head. '_Where did __that__ thought come from? Out! Shoo, shoo crazy thought.' _I reached into my pocket as my cell phone buzzed and I pulled it out to look at it.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Logan's hand twitch, and finally he sighed, and recited, "There's no cell phones allowed in the library." I cocked an eyebrow as he rambled on, "If you need to make a call there's pay phones downstairs." I just ignored him, knowing that it would annoy him even further and I liked to annoy people sometimes. "There's also a 200 dollar fine if you get caught."

Well that definitely wasn't going to happen. I loved money too much and I've spent too much time winning it from other people in Poker and other schemes that I have had over the years that I wasn't going to give it up by a stupid fine from a library.

"Well, now that you're done with that," Logan got up and stretched, his shirt rising up for just a minute, exposing his stomach. I looked away politely, a light blush staining my cheeks. "Let's go and-"

"Wait a minute," I held up a hand, causing Logan to look at me with a curious expression on his face. "Camille was the one that called you in the car, wasn't it?" I asked, getting right to the point. Logan looked back at me with a confused expression, then it rapidly changed to one of recognition and then slid over to a look of uneasiness. "I'm not going to leave you alone about until you tell me why you and Camille broke up."

Logan sighed again and then sat back down on the window seat. "Well, I only told the guys this so far," he stated, rubbing the back of his neck.

That surprised me, but I tried not to let it show. James had recently told me that he was sort of upset because they all seemed to be drifting apart, but now Logan was saying that he told the guys why they broke up before telling me. I guess that they were trying harder to make sure their friendship didn't fall apart.

My heart went out to them.

"At first when we started dating it was back in the Palm Woods," Logan stated, smiling a little at the memory. "And things were great then, because all we had to do was be a band as well as hanging out with our friends. But as we got older and our band kept getting bigger, before we ended it I mean, I wasn't able to spend as much time with Camille as I wanted because Gustavo and Griffin were making us do this and that over and over and over again with barely any breaks. We thought that when Big Time Rush ended we'd be able to spend more time together so Camille and I moved into an apartment together," Logan took a breath and swallowed thickly as he rubbed his hands over his pants. "It was great at first, but then she kept getting more acting jobs at theatres and in commercials in stuff and while she was gone, I would try to battle the loneliness by studying to become a doctor."

"I was finally able to start living the dream that I had ever since I was a kid and I loved it. At first we were able to spend a lot of time together, her helping me with my homework, me helping her with her lines or auditions, but then as her career took off and I kept going up in years of schooling we got way too busy. Then we got annoyed over very stupid little things and realized that maybe we weren't as close as we were before or that we were moving our relationship too fast. So we decided just to be friends and she moved out."

Logan shrugged, as if that was that.

But I knew that wasn't everything. I knew that Camille wanted him back, but I wasn't sure about him. I cupped my chin in my hands as I thought about it, bringing my feet up underneath me as I did so. Logan then had a pained expression on his face, I looked over at him and he pointed at the poster hanging from one of the bookshelves. "Please keep your feet off the window seat." He read.

I sighed and stood up, taking the poster off the wall and pushing it under a pile of books. "There! That rule no longer applies." I stated triumphantly.

"But- "

"You know what your problem is, Logie?" I stated as I turned and looked over at him again. "You're too uptight and you always have been. You follow the rules _way_ too closely. You're practically the living definition of a goody-goody! Loosen up a bit, you know?"

"But-"

"Come on. You can't even tell someone to shut up to save your own life-"

"Okay, I get the point!" Logan commented, holding up a hand to get me to stop.

"All I'm saying is that you need to let go. Even a tiny bit, you know?"

Logan made a choking noise. "Fine," he huffed, and following my example and sitting on the window seat, propping his feet on the other end.

My cell phone rang and I pulled it out of his back pocket.

Automatically, Logan said, "no cell phones in the library."

I just looked at him, an eyebrow raised.

"200 dollar fine."

Gone was the phone.

Yep, 200 dollar fines are _definitely_ the magic words.

* * *

"So who knew that we'd end up spending the whole day at the library," Logan commented as we drove back to the campus. I snorted as I rolled my eyes.

"Who would have thought it?" I replied sarcastically. "I mean, considering the fact that we have also spend entire _days_ at the bookstore debating whether or not books should have had sequels along with the fact that they should have been made in the first place." I twirled my fingers in the air. "And you even put your feet up on the window seat; you're a _wild_ man, Mr. Mitchell."

"Well, you don't need to be so mean about it." Logan replied with mock hurt, although he was laughing. "But I can say thank you."

"For what?"

"For loosening me up," Logan replied with a shrug. "You were right; I do need to stop being so uptight sometimes. The guys always told me that when we were younger and I went along with the plans that Kendall came up with all the time, but always had a nagging feeling of pessimism as well. So it's a welcome change."

"Huh," I nodded slowly. "But who was the one that I bumped into at that nightclub?"

"Touché." Logan pulled up to the campus and quickly got out of the car before hurrying around to my side and opened the door for me. I smiled at him as he did so. "Sorry, I can loosen up, but I can't shake being a gentleman as well as the fact that my mom raised me that way."

"Good to know." I replied and smiled as Logan leaned down and kissed my cheek.

"See you later," he waved, got back into the car and drove away.

I smiled as I touched the spot where Logan kissed me…

And James kissed me…

I needed to talk to Kendall.

* * *

**A/N: And here's the chapter focused solely on Logan and Katie and he kissed her cheek too awwwwww! And now she has to talk to Kendall, probably because she's too embarrassed to talk to her mom. Now you know why Logan and Camille broke up. Things will get even more heated in the next chapters. I'll update again soon and I'll explain why the guys drifted apart and what their ideas on it are.**

**-Riley**


	18. Phone Call with Big Brother

**Phone Call with Big Brother**

**A/N: This chapter is mostly dialogue, because it's about Katie calling her brother. Yeah. Go read.**

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**I drummed my fingers on my thigh as I sat on my bed, my back against the wall and watching as Sarah painted her nails. It was a girl's night in for us, and thankfully we didn't have to work tonight, so we were taking advantage of it. But I needed to take a break so I could talk to Kendall, and I knew that Sarah wanted to know what was going on between me and James and Logan and it would have been better for her to figure it out while I was getting my answers myself.

I don't know how I felt about the two of them, or I wouldn't allow myself to think about it. I mean, they were the guys, and they both _kissed me_.

Well, they kissed me on the cheek, but I hadn't been kissed by a guy since Dak and I were dating so it just caused me to be confused. (Especially since most of my friends were guys and my friends that were girls mostly had boyfriends and had different opinions about things like this.)

So I knew that calling Kendall (who would probably freak out about it at first) would be able to help me. I smiled as I thought about our relationship over the years. But for whatever reason, one memory in particular came to mind.

Life, though it bores me at times, is always accompanied by the standard twists, turns, ups, downs, and even the occasional loop de loops; maturity is simply the mastery of these challenges. Over time, I've learned to appreciate the thrills and excitement. However, I used to be completely horrified of anything where my feet weren't touching the solid ground, but that was back when I thought my brother Kendall was the coolest person ever. (Well, he still is, but most times I won't willingly admit it.)

My family was spending summer vacation in Florida, and of course Kendall and I really wanted to go to Adventure Island. I spent exhausting days of altogether refusing to go near roller coasters (and I'll admit it, it was because I was afraid.) Unfortunately, I waffled because of Kendall claiming he lost all respect for me. (Back then, his respect was a must because I was his baby sister, and losing it was a risk I was not willing to take.)

At first, the ride was fine, but then the cart started to climb the hill and I freaked out. At the top I allowed myself a peek at the ground. It was absolutely amazing; I was on top of the world. Before I could catch my breath, we went roaring down the steep drop so fast that everything around me merged into one big blur. On the way down, I screamed my lungs out and kept my arms raised up high the whole way, just as Kendall had instructed me to. I remained deadest on making my big brother proud.

In his eyes, this first rollercoaster ride had entitled me to so much respect (especially at my age of six). Kendall gave me a piggy-back ride out of the park that night, and I couldn't help but grin like crazy. We had gotten closer after that and now we were each other's best friends.

"_Hey Baby Sister"_ I heard Kendall's voice on the line, he sounded tired.

"Hey Big Brother," I replied, pulling my knees to my chest and looked at my watch. "Did I catch you at a bad time?" Sarah looked up at me and I pointed to the phone mouthing 'Kendall'. She nodded and bent her head back to look at her feet, although I knew she was listening closely.

"_Is one in the morning a bad time?"_ I could hear the grumpiness creep into his tone. He always got grumpy when he was woken up from his sleep. But then later in the day he was perfectly happy. _"What do you think?"_

"Sorry," I apologized quickly, not taking offense to him. I never did. "But there's something important I want to talk to you about."

"_Is it about Logan and James?"_

"Wha-?" That threw me for a loop. How could he possibly know that? I hadn't ever mentioned it to him and he usually too busy with hockey to read any of the gossip sites or magazines. "How'd you know that it was about them?"

"_Because there's such thing as a phone and people call each other on it."_ Kendall chuckled and yawned. _"Just because we don't talk as much as we used to, doesn't mean they wouldn't call me to tell me how my baby sister is doing."_

"How much do you know?"

"_That you've been spending __a lot__ of time with them."_

I hated the tone of Kendall's voice, as if he knew something that I didn't know. "Whatever," I snapped, rolling my eyes. Sarah noticed my snap and looked over at me eagerly. "Just because I hang out with them doesn't mean that I'm not going to date them or anything." In a flash Sarah was at my side, her ear pressed against my phone to listen to the conversation.

"_Did I say that you were going to?"_ Kendall laughed again. _"You were the one that came up with that conclusion."_ I just pouted. Even though I know that he couldn't see me, he knew that I was pouting. _"Don't pout at me. "_ See. _"Even though I hate to say this, you're very beautiful, so someone is going to want to date you eventually."_

"Yeah, but it's not James and Logan. They're just trying to help me keep from going crazy with all this school work." I twirled my hair around my finger. "You're lucky that you're not in college right now."

"_Actually, you're the lucky one,"_ Kendall replied_. "You're getting an education and you're going to go far and get a great job once you graduate."_

"And yet, you're the one that was in a boy band and is now living your dream."

"_Yeah, well,"_ there was a comfortable pause. We didn't always have to talk when we were around each other. I enjoyed it when all the two of us did was just sit together, not saying anything. We knew what each other was thinking. _"Anyway, if they wanted to date you, which I'm not saying they are, then I wouldn't care that much."_

"You wouldn't?" I didn't believe that for a second.

"_I mean, I would care. But I wouldn't go into the whole, stalking you on a date kind of thing. They're my buds, I've known them for years and I know that they would take care of you."_

"But," I prompted, knowing that it was coming.

"_But,"_ Kendall spoke up; I could practically see the smile on his face. _"If one of them hurt you…I'd kill them and that goes for any guy that you date."_

"I know," I smiled. "Thanks."

"_Is that all?"_

"Yeah, why?"

"_Good, then let me go back to sleep."_

"Fine, bye Big Brother."

"_Bye Baby Sister."_

I hung up the phone seconds before Sarah had grabbed my shoulders and was shaking me back and forth, her screeching reaching my ears. The only thing that I could get out of it was that she knew that I had a thing for the guys and that she knew that it was only a matter of time until I realized it myself.

"Sarah, stop!" I moved Sarah's hands off of my shoulders. "I don't like them like that, they're just my friends."

"Yeah right," Sarah got to her feet and started to jump up and down on my bed, laughing uncontrollably. She had definitely snapped her cap. "You're in _love_, you _love_ them and they _love_ you too!" she sang at the top of her lungs.

"Shut up!" I grabbed her around the knees and tackled her onto the bed. When she was down I grabbed my pillow and beat her with it until she was begging for mercy. "Will you promise to stop saying that I'm in love with them when I'm not?"

"Yeah, sure." Sarah held her hands over her face, which had gone red from laughing so hard, slowly leaning up; just to make sure that I didn't hit her again. "But you do."

_Thwack!_

_

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_**A/N: So let me just tell you guys something…I don't know how much time has passed in between chapters unless I say it, and…I'm sort of making it up as I go along. I just wanted to get that off of my chest. I don't know how long this story is going to be (yet.) Anything that you guys would like tosee as it goes on? Thanks for reading guys, I'll update again soon. **

**Cheers,**

**-Riley**


	19. Just Friends

**Just Friends**

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**"So Katie, when were you going to tell us about these hot dates that you have been going on lately?" Jacob questioned, swatting me on the arm as I passed by his table. The lunch rush had just ended at work and we were cleaning up some tables before some more customers came by.

"What are you talking about?" I asked, nearly choking on my spit. "I haven't been on any dates in a _long_ time, you know that."

"That's not what Sarah and Charlie are telling me." Jacob replied as he turned back towards me, looking up from the pile of silverware that he was dumping into the black bucket that he was balancing on his hip. "Apparently you've been dating your brother's best friends for a while." He grinned as he put the bucket down before starting to dance around. "Katie and James sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G-"

"Has anyone ever told you that you can be extremely childish?" I asked, brushing my hair behind my ears and making sure that my ponytail was still intact.

"Yep," Jacob reply as he stopped dancing. "My family tells me that all the time, but I guess that's what happens when you're the baby of the family." He added as an afterthought and started singing again. "First come love, then comes marriage-"

"Do you really have to sing?"

"Yes, and I still have the rest of this song and then I have to start in on Logan."

I rolled my eyes and abandoned Jacob in the front of the restaurant as I grabbed my own bucket of dirty dishes and walked to the kitchen. Sarah and Charlie were already back there, cleaning up some dishes as the cooks started to prepare some of the foods that we had for dinner.

"You just had to tell him didn't you?" I commented to Sarah as I placed the bin down beside the two of them.

"Tell him what?" Sarah asked innocently, although that was probably the biggest smile that I had ever seen on her face.

"That I've been _hanging out_ with James and Logan," I commented, crossing my arms over my chest. "But do you want to know what Jacob got out of it? He thinks that we're dating. How could he _possibly _have gotten an idea like that?" I demanded, tapping my chin. "Oh probably from the warped minds from you two."

"All I said was that it would be cute if you dated," Charlie spoke up as Sarah started laughing. "It's Jacob's fault that he someone changed my words to its cute that you're dating."

"I'm still blaming you." I commented, giving Sarah the evil eye.

"Yeah, well, you can't do anything about it because I'm your best friend and your roommate and you'd go to jail if you tried to kill me." Sarah pointed out as she stuck out her tongue. She had me on that one, but I'm Katie Knight, the girl that was able to prank anybody and anything that moved from the years when I was back at the Palm Woods.

"That's true," I commented simply and then smiled evilly. "But you're forgetting that I know _a lot_ of secrets about you as well as knowing practically every prank in the book." I smirked as Sarah's smile was replaced with a suspicious frown. "So I can get you somehow, someway."

"Touché" she replied with a raised eyebrow.

"But like I said to Jacob, and to Sarah, and to Kendall," I threw my hands into the air. "I'm _not_ dating James or Logan." I looked back and forth from Charlie to Sarah, to make sure they had heard me. "Alright?"

"Fine." Sarah replied with a slight shrug.

"Whatever you say." Charlie added with a hint of a smile.

"Guys," I groaned, rolling my eyes.

"Why don't you just admit it Kates," Jacob announced his presence by loudly dropping the bucket of silverware beside mine, causing me to jump at the loud crashing sound (to which Jacob burst out laughing.) "You have the hots for James and Logan and you're stringing them both along because you don't know which one you want to date."

"That's not true." I stated as I shook my head in annoyance. "Does anyone ever listen to me anymore?"

"No," Sarah, Charlie, and Jacob replied in unison.

"You guys are the worst, you know that right?" I laughed as I moved over to an empty space of the counter and pulled myself up until I was sitting on it. "Can we please talk about something else?" I asked, rubbing my neck. "Anything else."

"Sure," Charlie grinned evilly and turned to Jacob, placing a soapy hand on her hip. "Let's talk about Jacob's really rude customers and how he got back at them with a fly in their food."

I laughed along with everyone else as it was now Jacob's turn to get teased.

I was just glad that the attention was off of me.

Me and my non-existent love-life.

* * *

"See you later, Katie!"

"See you back at the dorm, Kates!"

"Later chickie!"

I smiled and waved to my friends as I walked over to my car, taking my keys out of my pocket as I did so. Not that I needed to, if anyone wanted to attack me I could easily beat them up and cause them to not want to touch me again. I've never taken a martial arts class, but I had the fire power and the will to fight anyway.

"Katie!"

A hand landed on my shoulder and I gasped, turning around and punching the person in the stomach, before I even recognized who the person was. I smiled a little when I saw Dak hunch over and hold onto his stomach.

"Hold on," he gasped, his voice a little high-pitched. "I'll be fine in a few seconds." He continued to gasp for air as I stood over him, my arms crossed across my chest, looking around. Finally, Dak stood up straight, catching his breath. "Finally you're alone, you haven't answered any of my texts or phone calls and I really need to talk to you."

That was true, I had put his number into my phone just so I could get the satisfaction of knowing that I had ignored his call or deleted his text. Unfortunately, Dak was never one to give up. That was something that I liked about him at first, but now it just drove me insane. "What do you want? If you haven't noticed I'm trying to get home."

"It's only going to take a few minute," Dak stated and licked his lips. "I'm sorry about the way that things ended." He stated and that surprised me. He actually looked serious, he was sorry. I could tell from the way that he was looking at me. My gaze flicked down to his fingers. They weren't twitching, when they twitched it was a sure sign that he was lying. "I really am sorry, and it was stupid. I just got tired of the paparazzi and I started to doubt myself as well as doubted our relationship and I got scared about how things were going t so I started to distance myself before breaking up with you completely. It was stupid and it was wrong and I realize now that I really hurt you."

"Yeah, you did." I commented, nodding.

"And I know that you're completely over me and don't want to take me back," Dak stated and then bobbed his head back and forth. "Not that I'm even asking you back, but I was just hoping that we could start over again."

"Start over again…how?" I asked, narrowing my eyes a little.

"By starting out as friends." He gave a hopeful smile.

I started to laugh. "Friends?" I sputtered. "We're barely acquaintances."

"Yeah, but that's only because you won't talk to me, even if we've been partnered for projects and stuff." He looked at me and then looked away and I felt a little guilty. I had been blowing him off when we were paired for some school work. But thankfully he did all of the work and put my name on it, so I wouldn't get a bad grade. "Katie, we're going to be stuck around each other for a long time because we're in the same school year and we're at the same college, we're bound to have some classes together, so why not get over the awkwardness and at least try to enjoy each other's company again."

I sighed as I ran my hands through my hair again. Before we started dating we had a blast together and I could never forget those times. It was a lot of fun and I found that he was easy to talk to and was a normal teenager, no matter how big he got for his singing. And now here he was, trying to make things right again.

Call me a wimp, but I'm the kind of girl that would immediately take an apology if I knew that someone was being sincere and Dak was definitely being sincere. He must have seen my hardened expression soften as he smiled and took a small step forward.

"Can we just start over?" Dak asked, looking at me with a small boyish smile. "As friends?"

I held my breath for a second and then let it out, scratching my forehead. "Just friends?" I questioned, raising an eyebrow, slowly holding my hand out.

Dak grinned and took my hand, shaking it firmly. "Just friends."

Boy, I was throwing that word around a lot lately. Most people say that a guy and a girl can't be just friends. But I'm a different kind of girl. I was going to make this work.

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**A/N: Short chapter, but it's a filler anyway. Next chapter has James and Logan again (and they may be getting a little jealous, who knows.) :). But I need your guys' help on something, do you want James and Katie and Logan and Katie to go on dates (like actual dates) sooner or later? Thanks for the wait, you guys are awesome and if I don't update anything again on Monday…then Happy Valentine's/Single Awareness Day everyone! Have fun even if you're single ('cause that's what I'm going to do.)**

**Cheers,**

**-Riley**


	20. Katie's Journal: Denial

**Katie's Journal - Denial**

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* * *

**_I don't love you._

_Not that I know of. I don't think I'd die for you. There's not even much I would sacrifice for your sake. It wouldn't kill me if you found yourself someone to love. It might hurt a little bit, but it's nothing I wouldn't be able to handle. When you smile, my heart only does a little dance. Nothing big, like a waltz or the samba or anything. I wish you'd stop surprising me, because quite frankly, it's starting to get me stressed. I don't know when you're going to pop up or if I'm going to have to drop everything just make you stop giving me that pout you always give me when I can't do something._

_I'm not in love with you._

_I wouldn't follow you to the ends of the earth. Maybe to a nearby restaurant, or to your house, or to mine. But not to the ends of the earth. I'm not in love with you. You're not constantly in my thoughts; I only think of you when I see you. _

_Out of sight, out of mind._

_You make me smile. You make me laugh. When I see you, I smile. Your laughter is contagious. But I don't love you. Not like that. I love you in a totally platonic, friend-type manner. I don't want you in any other way than as a friend. A really close friend. And everyone __does__ love you. _

_You know that, right? _

_Yeah, I like to make you laugh, but that's only because it's fun. I tease you, yeah, but that's because you're such a good sport about it. If I __did__ love you, there's no way I could be the way I am now. I would be wallowing in angst like those chumps on those teenage soap operas that they're always showing on TV. I'm just a friend who wants to be a close to you. This feeling isn't love. It isn't even very strong like. I'm only your friend, and that's okay with me._

_I'm not in love with you…._

…_I think_

_

* * *

_**A/N: Alright, so I bet that you guys are thinking that this chapter doesn't fit well with the flow of the story. If any of you are thinking that I agree. I didn't really know what to do for the chapter before some…other things move on with Katie and the guys, so I tried to figure it out. I couldn't really think of anything so I thought what if the readers had a journal/diary entry of Katie's thoughts over everything. That way you guys would be tied over and I can still figure out what's going to happen. *Insert snort here* Yeah, that worked well. I think I made her personality like her in here, but I know it didn't help you guys much as there wasn't James or Logan drama. But the next chapters are chop-full of them so keep watching for e-mail for the next update. Thanks!**

**Cheers,**

**-Riley**

**PS- I kept the journal entry vague on purpose, to see who you guys think she's talking about. (The answer will be revealed soon though.)**


	21. Could you ask me out on a date

'**Could You Ask Me Out On a Date?'**

**

* * *

**Sarah cornered me on the way to the cafeteria right after I got out my favorite class, and I knew from the look on her face that she had some great news to tell me. But I could also tell from that same look on her face that there was something that she was going to tell me that I didn't want to hear.

"Katie, you me, and Devin are going out on a date tomorrow night." She announced. My facial expressions changed rapidly. I smiled at first, happy to know that she and her new boyfriend were hitting it off, but then it turned to an expression of confusion, then to one of horror and anger when I finally realized what she said. "Don't look at me like that; I really need you to do this." She grabbed my shoulders and looked pleadingly into my eyes. "How many favors have I done for you?" She stuck out her lower lip. "I really need this Kates, he wants to meet you and-"

"Fine," I held up a hand. "Fine, but I'm not going to do this ever again." I warned her. "This is a onetime thing, alright?"

"Yes, yes, that's fine!" Sarah squealed as she jumped up and down, clapping her hands together. "Thank you so much, Katie." She paused and tapped a finger against her chin. "Hmm, who are we going to get to go on a date with you?"

"Let me figure that one out for myself," I stated as I gave her a slight stink-eye. "I'm the one that's going on the date, so I get to choose him, alright."

Yeah, that was two hours ago, and I have no idea who my date would be that night. My first thought was to go and ask Dak if he knew anyone that I could 'date'. At first he thought that I was asking him out, but after I quickly reminded him that we were just friends. After clearing that up, he agreed and tried to think of any guy that he knew that would go out on a date with me, and unfortunately I had no luck there.

After a few more hours of thinking, I pretty much had one choice left.

* * *

I found James in Starbucks, the exact place that I thought he was going to be. He was buying coffee and was a little startled when he saw me standing next to him, but then he quickly gave me a grin. "Hi Katie, what's up?" He looked at his watch and frowned a little. "Were we supposed to meet up today?"

"Hey James." I said with a quick grin and slid into the chair across from him. "No we didn't have any plans, but I need to talk to you."

"Could I get another one of this?" James asked the barista and handed me the coffee he was holding. I made a face as I took a sip, not really liking coffee at all.

"Thanks." I mumbled before grabbing the creamer and a bunch of packets of sugar. I was going to keep it tasting like chalk somehow. James gave me an odd look as he raised an eyebrow, silently urging me to tell him what was going on. I took a deep breath and pushed my coffee aside, resting my arms on the table and looking at him seriously. "Um, James. I need to ask you of a favor. And I hope you don't think I'm a freak." I told him nervously.

"Yeah," James' eyebrow twitched and he looked slightly amused. "What's up?"

I took a deep breath and blurted the question out before I could stop myself. "Could you ask me on a date?" I wasn't expecting that to come out of my mouth, but it did. And from the look on James's face, he also was not expecting it to come out of my mouth either.

"I've never been asked… to ask someone out on a date." he said with a soft smile.

"I'll buy the dinner and everything." I added quickly. "Just help me, please. And I'll wash your clothes, and even iron them for a month." I sounded more and more pathetic with every passing second. "Even if you have to constantly drive over to the school to drop them off-"

"You really don't have to." James replied. Disappointed, I got up. "Will you go out with me this Friday?" I heard him say when I had turned to walk away.

I practically choked when I turned back around and looked at him. James looked at me curiously and I was sure that my eyes had bugged out of my head. "W-What?" I sputtered as I turned back to face him.

"Will you go out with me?" he repeated with a slight lift to his voice.

"I was…" I sighed and wrung my hands together as I shook my head. "You don't have to pity me. I was just in need of a favor. You don't have to go with it." I mumbled.

"I don't need you to ask for a favor or wash my clothes for me to go on a date with you." James insisted as he stood up, forcing me to look up at him. "I really want to go out with you." He stared right into my eyes.

"It's just; Sarah wants to go out with you and me on a double date." I began to explain. I was refusing to hear what he was saying. "As a favor to her."

"Katie, listen to me." James said, holding my arm.

I looked at him.

He was looking directly into my eyes. I had never realized how green his eyes were. They went well with his tall, dark and handsome look and added a factor of mystery. "Katie, go out with me this Friday. I don't care if you came to me first to ask for a favor. I wanted to ask you out actually, but I guess I never had the courage to do so."

"You wanted to go out with me?" I asked back. I was sure that he was going to change his opinion of me because I sounded like an idiot. "Um, yeah." I brushed my hair behind my ears. "I'll go out with you."

"Great." he smiled. "I'll pick you up eight?"

"Yeah, sure."

* * *

Ok, I was slightly annoyed, because after I told Sarah that I would be going with James with them on a date, she told me that she and Devin were going to go out later and that it was only a ploy for me to go out with Logan or James. I was annoyed with her at first and then I realized that I actually _did _want to go on a date with James. And that thought alone caused me to get really nervous for the rest of the week. So much so that everyone noticed that I wasn't being myself.

When Friday rolled around, I had absolutely no idea what to do with my date with James, and I didn't even know if I wanted to tell anyone about it. But I eventually broke down and called Kendall, who expressed how happy he was (which was weird to me) and then got Jo to come over and help me and Sarah pick out what to wear on my date; A pair of jeans, a purple tank top, and a black shrunken blazer with black ballet flats.

A few minutes before the clock on my wall turned to eight, there was a knock at my door and James was standing on the other side. He was wearing dark jeans with a blue button down shirt.

"Hey" He greeted with a grin and short wave.

"Hey," I replied quietly, a small smile on my face. "Wanna go?" I asked and he followed me out the room and together we walked in silence to the small Chinese restaurant close to the campus. After ordering, we fell into silence for a few minutes until we both spoke at the same time. We stopped and laughed at the awkwardness.

"You go first." I stated, feeling kind of shy suddenly.

"You look really beautiful." he told me and I felt my cheeks flame.

"You don't look bad yourself." I told him as we arrived at the restaurant and went inside, quickly getting seated.

The date went by surprisingly well, after we got over the jitters at the beginning we started talking and acting like we normally did, completely comfortable with each other. As we ate we talked about music, movies, classes, and every kind of trouble that we had gotten into when we were at the Palm Woods. Much to his annoyance, I even reminded James that on my first 'date' with a kid named Kyle from the Palm Woods that I had a crush on, and he almost ruined it because he was being overprotective. James quickly defended himself saying that he was looking out for me for Kendall, who was too busy trying to help Carlos get a date. (I didn't believe that for a second, but it was still nice to talk about it.) We continued to reminisce about everything that we went through and it just made things pass by really fast.

Before I knew it we were the only two customers left at the restaurant because it was almost closing time. I hadn't noticed how fast time went by because we were having a lot of fun. When the waiter told us that it was closing time, he asked for the check and when I went for my purse, James gently stopped me.

"I told you I would pay for the dinner." I reminded him.

"And I told you that I didn't want that," James stated as he smiled at me, his eyes flashing with an amusement. "This isn't the date you wanted as a favor. This is a real date and Miss. Knight, I'm paying."

I let him pay and we gathered out stuff and left the restaurant. We started walking back to the campus and I jumped a little when I felt James worm his hand into mine. I smiled at the feeling and when he knew that I wasn't going to let go, James pulled me even closer to him. The weather was rather chillier than usual, and being close to him provided the warmth I needed. In a few minutes, we were standing before my dorm building. It was surprisingly uncrowned despite being a Friday night.

"I had a lot of fun." I told him as I faced him.

Before I could move, James leaned down and planted his lips against mine. It was soft and sweet and I felt sparks all over my body and butterflies in my stomach. When he parted his lips from mine, my eyes remained close, and then he leaned towards my ear.

"Thanks for asking me to ask you out." he whispered softly.

"Thanks for saying yes to asking me out." I told him when I opened my eyes.

* * *

**A/N: I bet you guys really liked that chapter. It finally got to some of the point. I really enjoyed writing it as well. The next chapter will be updated soon.**

**Cheers,**

**-Riley**


	22. Could You Please Not Do That

'**Could You Please Not Do That?'**

**

* * *

**Katie hesitated outside of Logan's apartment.

After she and James kissed, Katie panicked and was starting to avoid him. James called her constantly at first, leaving messages and asking if she was ok. Then Kendall started to call and ask if everything was ok as well. She would take Kendall's calls but not James'. It was too weird. They were friends…they had gone on a date, and he had kissed her. She knew that her feelings for James, the tiny ones that she had had for him back when she was younger was starting to come back and she denied it, not knowing what else to do. Sarah, Charlie, and Jacob tried to get her to talk to them at work, but she just busied herself, bussing tables, washing dishes, making some food, just so she didn't have to talk to them.

At schools she and Dak started to get along better and he knew her well enough to know that there was something wrong, but didn't press her about it. Although he had asked how her date went, since she had asked him first if he knew anyone that wanted to date, and Katie swiftly and sharply changed the subject. Dak quickly took the hint that that was what she was upset about and knew not to talk about it as well.

She needed someone that she could trust to talk to about this but didn't know who to talk with. Jo, Camille, and Stephanie would probably make things harder for her and Katie was feeling a little awkward around Camille as she was good friends with Logan, and hanging around his ex, knowing things about him that Camille didn't just made things hard. But she pushed those thoughts out of her head when the weekend came around again, exactly a week after James kissed her, and Logan called and asked if she wanted to hang out.

Katie readily agreed, knowing that she wanted to do something to get her mind off of James and that's why she was at his apartment. He said he felt like staying in and watching a movie and just hanging out instead of going out somewhere, and Katie was perfectly fine with that.

Taking in a deep breath, she reached up and knocked on the door.

Almost instantly it was thrown open and Logan smiled down at her, Katie couldn't help but smiling back as he took a step back and let her inside the spacious apartment. Logan looked very handsome. Instead of the usual sweater vest, tie, and khakis that he usually wore, he had recently showered (Katie could smell the scent of body wash), and put on a nice light blue polo and jeans. She noticed that the color of his polo brought out his brown eyes more.

Katie looked around the apartment as she took off her coat, Logan grabbed it as soon as it was off of her shoulders and he quickly went to put it in the closet. It was obvious that it was built to hold two people, but now that Camille had moved out he moved around his stuff so it wouldn't look like there was supposed to be anyone else there.

"You ok?" Katie jumped, realizing that she was staring out in space, and smiled over at Logan. "You kinda zoned out there."

"Just taking it all in." Katie replied with a smile. "From the look of the things that you have, it's kind of obvious that you're trying to be a doctor." Logan raised his eyebrows as he crossed his arms over his chest.

"Oh yeah?" he smirked a little. "What gives you that idea?"

"The bookshelf," Katie pointed and then walked over to it, raising an eyebrow as she scanned the titles before turning back around and grinned at him. "No one else I know has a bookshelf _filled_ with medical books."

"Ok, you got me there." Logan laughed as he raised his hands defensively. He turned and walked over to the living room, where the TV was on ESPN playing the highlights of a hockey game.

'_Of course_' Katie thought to herself, smiling a little when she realized that he still had his hockey obsession, much like the other guys still did. She slowly walked behind him, looking at the plates and glasses that were left on the coffee table.

"Sorry for the mess." Logan apologized as he moved a few magazines aside to make space on the coffee table, noticing her staring at it. "I've been a bit busy lately."

"That's fine," Katie gave a smile, trying to get him to relax, he was still her friend. "My room is almost as messy, but that's mostly Sarah's fault."

"Do you want something to eat or drink before I start the movie?" Logan asked, as he grabbed the remote and changed the channel on the TV.

Katie raised and lowered one shoulder. "I can have something to drink I guess."

"Alrighty!" Logan replied as he got to his feet. Katie followed him to the doorway to the kitchen and he stopped, holding out his arm. "Ladies first!"

"Who said chivalry was dead?" Katie teased as she walked by him.

"I didn't." Logan replied and strolled over to the refrigerator and pulled it open, bending over to look into it. "Let's see, we have Coke, Sprite and Lemonade I think, which one do you want?"

"Uh, Lemonade." Katie gazed around at the sight of the dimly-lit kitchen. Logan closed the refrigerator door and tossed her the bottle of the liquid. She took it and cracked it open, taking a sip as Logan took a bottle for himself before turning around and opening a cabinet and pulling out a bag of popcorn.

"You can't watch a movie and not have popcorn." Logan stated when he caught her staring at him. Katie smiled back before turning around to look at the rest of the apartment.

She found his bedroom easily, nice and neat, pictures of him and Kendall, James, and Carlos. There were pictures of her with the guys, as well as pictures of Jo, Camille, and Stephanie. She saw a picture on the nightstand beside Logan's bed that was put facedown and Katie could only guess that it was a picture of Camille. Katie continued to look around the apartment and found another bedroom. It was pretty empty, but it still looked like someone had lived there once before.

"I'm sure this was Camille's room." Katie muttered to herself.

"You're right," Logan spoke up from behind her. Katie whirled around and looked apologetic, but Logan didn't seem to notice it. "This room used to be hers, but she didn't spend much time in it."

_Ugh_. Katie wrinkled her nose before rolling her eyes. "What did I say before? I don't want to know about yours or anybody else's sex life!"

"Sure thing." Logan smiled a little, but it waned. "I didn't know what to do with it when she moved out though." Katie just nodded, not sure what to say.

"Do…do you guys still talk?" Katie asked after a minute.

Logan slid his hands into his jean pockets and shrugged. "Every now and then," he replied, tilting his head left and right. "We talked a couple of days ago, it was nice." Katie nodded again. Logan let out a breath and then smiled again. "C'mon, the popcorn is almost ready."

"What movie are we watching?" Katie asked as she followed him out of the room.

"Armageddon," Logan replied as he grabbed a bowl from one of the cabinets and waited for the microwave to finish the popcorn. Katie snorted.

"What? Do you want to cry at it…again?" she teased, remembering all the times when they were at the Palm Woods how they would have a movie night with their friends at the Palm Woods. As a tradition, the last movie they watched was always Armageddon and Logan cried every time, not matter how much he tried to deny it. "You're such a wuss for crying at that movie."

"And you're heartless for not finding it sad." Logan countered easily, grinning over at her. Katie smiled back. He waited for the popcorn to finish popping before taking it from the microwave and transferring it over to the bowl. "C'mon," he placed a hand on her shoulder and squeezed it gently as he pushed her out the room. "It's movie time." He dropped his hand from her shoulder and put the popcorn down onto the coffee table and went to grab the DVD and the remote. "Feel free to take off your shoes." He stated, nodding towards he converses.

"I'm good." Katie replied as she lifted her feet and rested them on the edge of the table, bringing the bowl of popcorn to her lap.

Logan pushed in the DVD and pressed PLAY before coming back to the couch and sitting right next to Katie, close enough so that their arms brushed against each other. But neither of them moved or said anything about it, they just watched the movie. They started out watching the movie, but then Katie brought up the time that they were doing movie night in Bitters' large manager's office because he had a big TV and were trying not to get caught, and soon she and Logan were laughing hysterically, telling funny stories from their childhood and their years at the Palm Woods, rather than working on the project.

It wasn't until it was almost 5 that Katie realized that she had to get going. Katie sighed, hating the fact that she didn't really want to leave, and stood up, gathering her things off of the coffee table. "Is it five already?" Logan asked as he looked at his watch. "Whoa, I didn't realize that time went by so fast."

"Me neither." Katie agreed, brushing her hair behind her ears. "I had fun."

Logan smiled over at her, his arm behind her on the back of the couch. "Me too." He agreed and brushed her hair out of her face, lightly cupping her cheek.

"Could…" Katie's heart leapt into her throat. She could hear it beating really hard in her ears. "Could you please not do that?"

"Do what?" Logan asked, with a mischievous twinkle in his eye. "This?" he moved forward and kissed her. Katie kissed him back almost immediately. The way that Logan and James kissed was different. James as more passionate and hungry, which she had to admit she liked, and Logan was more soft and sweet, which she liked as well.

'_Logan's a good kisser_' Katie thought to herself as she gently placed her hands on Logan's chest. '_I wonder if he kissed Camille the same way_' Katie questioned. As soon as that thought entered her mind, her eyes flashed open and she pushed him away and leapt to her feet. "What?" he asked as Katie leapt to her feet. "What is it?"

"James kissed me," Katie blurted out, before she thought of what she was going to say. She wanted to say 'James kissed me, and you kissed me, and I'm confused.' But the first part was all that she could get out. The hard expression on Logan's face didn't help matters either.

"I know," Logan replied quietly.

"You know?" Katie repeated, now even more confused. Her heart was still beating really fast, her cheeks were still flushed. "How do you know?" She frowned. "Did Kendall or James tell you?"

"No," Logan replied calmly, looking up at her from where he was still sitting on the couch. "I…uh, I saw you."

"You saw us?" Katie repeated again.

"Yeah," Logan licked his lips. "I was there…at the restaurant that you guys were at." He scratched the back of his neck. "And…I kind of followed you guys back to the campus. But I didn't follow you on the date," Logan explained quickly when he saw Katie starting to glare. "Like, I didn't know that you were on a date with him until you were leaving. I was going to join you, but I thought that something else was going on, so I hung back."

"And then you followed us." Katie nodded, suddenly feeling hurt and betrayed. "Why?" Logan opened and closed his mouth for a few seconds and then stayed silent, looking away. Katie shook her head. "Never mind." She walked over to the closet and grabbed her coat before heading towards the door.

"Katie, wait!" Logan called after her.

But he got a slamming door in reply.

* * *

**A/N: Just so you know I have taken this scene from my fictionpress story ABCs of Growing Up and adapted it to this story with its characters. Since it was my words from my story, I felt that I could do that, and I felt that it could help me with this one as well. I hope you guys liked it.**

**Cheers,**

**-Riley**


	23. Decision

**Decision**

**

* * *

**I sighed as I rested my elbows on the kitchen table, waiting as my mom finished bustling around the kitchen so I could finally hear her response. As soon as it was the weekend, I went over to my mom's house to hide out there for a while and I turned off my phone. (Don't worry, I told my boss that I wasn't going to be at work for a while, I'm not that incompetent.) As soon as I got there and mom knew that something was wrong I spilled my guts to her. I explained everything that had been happening between me and Logan and James and then I told her how I felt about them.

I hadn't realized it until then, but I really liked the two of them and I could easily see myself with either one of them in a relationship. Now I was just waiting for mom's response, but she was being really quiet.

"Mom, talk to me." I stated as I gently grabbed her arm as she went to walk by me again. "Please tell me what's on your mind."

Mom sighed and sat down at the chair at the head of the table. She gave a half smile. "You're not going to like what I have to say."

"Just go ahead and say it," I replied, letting out another sigh. "I was stupid for trying to hide my feelings for so long, or I was stupid for stringing them along, or-"

"Actually, Katie, I was just going to say 'I told you so'." Mom replied with an amused smile.

"What?" I blinked at her, not sure what she meant.

Mom laughed as she gathered her hair into a ponytail and then let it drop behind her shoulders, resting her elbows on the table as she leaned forward, her eyes right on me. "I said I told you so. I knew that this was going to happen, and I told you that it was going to."

"When was this?" I asked, confused.

"Remember when James, Logan, Carlos, and Kendall were first together again, after Logan brought you home from hanging out with Sarah?" Mom replied.

_"I did not cheat!" I replied indignantly._

_"Yes you did," Logan slowly nodded, a strange look on his face. I raised an eyebrow as he leaned over and grabbed onto the pillow that he was sitting on and held it over his head, before leaning forward and hitting the top of my head with it._

_"Ow! Hey!" I cried, laughing, as I tried to get away from his grasp as he continued to hit me over the head, as if trying to get me to confess to him that I was indeed cheating. (It's not cheating, it was creative strategy.) "Stop!"_

_"Get her!" Carlos shouted and soon all four boys were holding pillows and hitting me over the head with them as I laughed hysterically, trying to get away._

_"Boys, stop hitting Katie with pillows," Mom stated as she walked into the room, barely even looking to see what was going on. I guess having lived with us for so long she could just guess. "Katie, could I talk with you in the kitchen?"_

_"Sure, mom." I laughed as I pushed Kendall's pillow out of my face and stuck my tongue out at him before getting up and following my mom into the kitchen. "What's up?" I asked as there was a flash of light outside the window, followed by a clap of thunder. I laughed when I heard Carlos' shriek from the other room. I looked over at mom and saw that she was staring at me with a raised eyebrow. "What?" I asked, backtracking, trying to think of what I could have done to make her annoyed._

_"Katie," Mom sighed and brushed her hair out of her face. "You and the boys…you're not a little kid anymore."_

_"Yeah, I'm kind of aware," I replied with a slow nod. "I mean, being in college and all-"_

_"No, Katie, I mean that you're a woman now," Mom interrupted, and I knew that she was really serious about something. "You can't go rolling around with Kendall and his friends anymore." I raised an eyebrow, waiting for her to finish. Her cheeks flushed a little bit and she continued. "You have breasts...and the guys are older than you-"_

_"Yeah, by three years," I interrupted. "And so what if I have breasts?" I threw my arms into the air. "I've had them for about six years now, and __I'm __used to it."_

_"But things aren't the same anymore, Katie." Mom continued. "You can still hang out with them, sure, but you can't continue to roll around with them, and you can't continue to hang out with them as much as you have in the past."_

_"Meaning?" I rolled a hand, prompting her to continue._

_"Meaning, Katie," Mom moved forward and placed a hand on my shoulder. "That things are going to change even if you don't want them to." She gave a soft smile. "That may be a good thing, and it could be a bad thing, but I wanted to warn you first."_

_"Well thanks for the warning." I looked at my watch. "But I don't have much time before I have to go to work, so could you let me go so I can take a shower before I go?"_

_"Sure," Mom replied and looked a little annoyed. I stopped and turned back to look at her. "What?"_

_"Mom, by any chance are you afraid that I'll fall for one of the guys?" I questioned after a second of thought. Mom looked genuinely confused and I took that as a good sign. "Just making sure. Mom, you know that the guys are like my brothers, it would be sooooo disgusting if I ever fell for one of them. Besides, Carlos is dating Stephanie, James is a dater in general, and Logan…well, he's Logan."_

_"I see that you've been asked that question before." Mom commented as she placed her hands on her hips. Her lips curled into a smile and in a second she was laughing a little. "I'm sorry, but that's just a little ridiculous."_

_"Yeah, by a lot of fan girls that threatened me," I replied with a snort. "But you know me, mom, its takes me along time to trust guys, and the guys are like my brothers. Nothing's gonna happen." I turned and went to take a shower, but not before I heard mom's mutter._

_I wasn't exactly sure, but I think she said 'It's not you that I'm worried about'._

"Mom, how did you ever get to be so smart?" I asked as I shook my head, smiling at her. Mom just smiled as she reached out and ran her fingers through my hair, brushing it out of my face.

"I'm a mom," she replied with a warm smile. "I'm supposed to be smart." Her smile faded and a serious look took its place. "Now, Katie, who do you think that would be the better person for you?" She held up a hand as I started to answer. "Keep in mind that I can't tell you who to date or hang out with or whatever you're going to do, I can only help you decide."

"Both of them have qualities that I really like in a guy." I replied slowly.

"Ok, try this," Mom took my hands in hers. "Close your eyes." I did as I was told. "Now clear your head of any thoughts that you have. Now…try and picture the person."

I did as I was told and opened my eyes, amazed, as I looked at my mom. "Did that work for you and dad?"

"No," Mom replied as she shook her head, I looked at her in confusion for a second. "But it helped me see you and Kendall, and I knew then that it helped me make the right choice. Your father and I…" she let out a breath. "We were in love, but then we realized that we weren't right for each other. Now I don't know if that's going to happen to you, but you're young, and you're a tough little thing, so I know that the decision that you've just made is a good one."

I smiled.

"Thanks mom."

* * *

**A/N: Alright guys, the next chapter has who Katie is going to choose, Logan or James. Who do you think it will be? :D**

**Cheers,**

**-Riley**


	24. Her Choice

**Her Choice**

**

* * *

**Katie held her breath as she slowly walked along the beach towards the pier, where they had agreed to meet. Her heart was thumping out of her chest and she felt like she was going to pass out, but she knew that it was just nerves. She never had to decide anything that big before in her entire life, and now….

Now she was going to confess her feelings for the one guy that she never thought (and had completely denied) she would have feelings for. He was basically impossible to get, being a part of Big Time Rush, where he could have gotten any girl, he moved onto bigger and better things, and now he wanted _her._

And _she_ wanted _him._

It didn't make sense, but it made her smile just the same.

"Ugh," Katie held her stomach; it started to gurgle with nerves, making her feel even more worried. "I can't do this." She muttered to herself as she stopped walking and turned back around, getting ready to walk away. "But I can't just leave him there, and…you can do this Katie, just get over your shyness, you can do this." Katie looked up and made a face at some kids that were watching her talk to herself. "What are _you_ looking at?" she barked.

"Having a hard time today, Katie?" Dak asked with a laugh as he walked towards her, his hands in the pockets of his shorts. "I'm sure that yelling at little kids isn't a good sign."

"You're not funny," Katie replied with a groan.

"What's wrong?" Dak asked, his smile waning a little.

Katie hesitated for a minute, wondering if she should tell her ex-boyfriend about her love life, but the two of them had been getting along ever since they decided to try being friends. They had even forgotten how much they had in common. The funny thing was that he had started to kind of date/hang out Sarah, and they were getting along well, so Katie knew that she was going to be seeing a lot of him, even if she didn't want to.

"Is it a guy?" Dak questioned, when Katie didn't readily reply.

"How did you know that?" Katie's eyes widened.

"It's not hard to figure out," Dak replied, his smile coming back. "The only time a girl gets that really nervous, I don't know what to do, second guessing look on their face is when it comes to a guy."

"You've been in too many movies." Katie remarked. Dak just shrugged. "Yeah, it has to do with a guy; I'm supposed to be meeting him right now, because I want to tell him how I feel about him, and-"

"And you're scared of what he's going to say." Dak interrupted again and smiled. "I felt the same way when I tried to tell you that I liked you, when we first started dating."

"You?" Katie snorted. "Nervous?" She raised a skeptical eyebrow. "You don't even get nervous when you don't know your lines for filming."

"I actually am _very_ nervous," Dak corrected her easily, shielding his face as the sun peeked out from behind the clouds. "I just don't show it, and that's all you need to do. Act confident, tell him how you feel." He shook his head. "He's an idiot if he lets you go," he added quietly. "And I would know."

Katie smiled as she brushed her hair behind her ears, making sure that her ponytail was perfect. "Thanks Dak."

"It's no problem," Dak replied with a nod and grabbed her shoulders. "Now to quote your brother, turn around and go get that boy…big time." He paused. "_Wow_ that was stupid."

"Yeah, it kind of was." Katie agreed. "But it actually helped too."

"So I helped that get you over your shyness."

"I'm not shy!" Katie replied sharply.

"Right," Dak looked skeptical. "So who was that girl that used to watch me from afar _thinking_ that I _wasn't_ paying attention to her?" He raised a hand to his chin. "Hmm, who _was_ that girl?" He grinned as Katie reached out and punched him on the arm. "I'm just kidding, good luck."

"Thanks." Katie breathed in reply and turned on her heels and walked down the pier, telling herself not to back out now. She felt herself smile when she saw the familiar brown head of hair. She took a deep breath and let it out before walking up behind him. It was obvious that he hadn't heard her come up as he didn't turn until she cleared her throat. "So where's our boat?" she questioned.

"What?" James asked, wrinkling his nose as he stood up and looked down at her, brushing off the seat of his pants.

"You mean you don't remember?" Katie asked, her voice quivering a little as she raised her eyebrows.

_"I know," James laughed bitterly. "She didn't believe it, because she and I have this special connection." He laughed. "I'm kind of embarrassed about it, but its coll." He frowned. "It was things like that that made me want to get away from here." He fell silent again and I turned my eyes to the water again. We stayed silent for a long time. "Are you going to come with me?"_

_"Huh?" I looked up at him, wrinkling my nose in confusion. "What do you mean?"_

_"I meant get on a ship and leave." James replied as he motioned out to the water. "I have enough money to buy two tickets, and wherever we go enough to rent an apartment so we can find jobs."_

_"Are you sure?" I knew he was joking, but I wanted to humor him anyway._

_"Yeah." James nodded seriously, as if he had been planning this for a long time. "It can work out perfectly." He turned to look at me, his eyes flashing excitedly. "As for the jobs, I heard about this one island not far from here so the tickets will be cheaper. They've been attracting some tourists so there are businesses looking for more help, right?"_

_"I guess." I pulled my legs back from under the railing and started to put my shoes back on. I enjoyed spending time with James, and conversations like these, where we could talk about anything and didn't judge each other was my favorite thing about all of it. "But are you sure that we should just leave everything behind?"_

_He smiled. "I'll stay if you want to stay. We'll go if you want us to go."_

"Are you serious?" James asked, a smile starting to break out on his face. He tried to keep it down, just in case he was getting his hopes up. "What about Logan? I knew that he liked you for a while, I could tell from the way that he looked at you, and because you were hanging out with him so much…"

Katie shook her head. "He didn't want me," she explained. "He was, subconsciously, using me to take Camille's. He didn't believe me at first, but when I went to his apartment to watch a movie, I saw that he still had pictures of her. He still loves her." She stated and then smirked. "I talked him into calling her; they're going to try their relationship again."

"Do you really want to leave LA?" James asked as he gently reached out and held onto Katie's hands.

"Well, no," Katie replied truthfully as she looked at her feet, a blush rising to her cheeks, feeling embarrassed. "I love it here, and…well, it's the only place I know besides Minnesota."

"I know," James chuckled. "I didn't really mean that I would go anytime soon, my only thought behind that was that you would be with me." He smiled as Katie's blush deepened and she continued to keep her head down. "But there is one thing I _would_ like."

"What?"

"To do this," James leaned down and Katie instinctively lifted her head and he kissed her.

And in that kiss, Katie knew that everything was going to be ok.

**THE END**

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A/N: Yep, she chose James in the end. That's what Mudmaster94 wanted so I gave it. But for all of those that wanted Katie and Logan, I'm putting up one more chapter (even though the story is over) just so you can see what happened when she did choose Logan.**

**Anyway, the story is now over at 24 (technically 25) chapters I would like to thank you guys for reading and reviewing and alerting and favoriting this story. I really enjoyed writing about Katie when she was older. Now, I'm actually not a fan of Jatie (JamesxKatie) but it was a request so I wrote it. It was kind of rushed, and I could have drawn the story out longer. I'll probably go back and edit it later.**

**Thanks for reading.**

**I was thinking of doing a sequel (or two) where it shows what Katie's life is like dating James, and one where it shows where she's dating Logan, but I might just make them one-shots. I don't know, either way, thanks again for reading.**

**Cheers,**

**-Riley**


	25. Alternate Ending

**Alternate Ending: Logan**

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**"Katie! Katie wait!"

I looked over my shoulder and my mouth dropped open when I saw Logan chasing after me. _Unbelievable_, I thought to myself as I turned back around and started to walk again. _He can't take a hint that I __don't__ want to talk to him. _I rolled my eyes. _But then again, he never was one to be great with girls._

After he kissed me and told me that he had followed me and James on our date I didn't want to talk to him. It made me feel humiliated an completely embarrassed. I mean, being followed on a date and having been watched while you kissed. And then having that person kiss you, gah it was just so confusing and annoying. Logan really broke my trust and my privacy and I never thought that he would be the kind of person that would do that. Kendall, maybe, but not Logan. He could choke on his food for all I cared.

"Katie, wait, please!" Logan grabbed my arm and I wrenched it out of his grasp before I continued walking. "Are you mad at me?"

"_Yes, I'm mad at you!"_ I exploded as I turned around to face him, eyes set in anger. "Why did you _think_ I ignored you? I'm not doing it for my health!"

"If you would just let me explain-"

"Explain what?" I threw my hands into the air. "Explain how you…"I trailed off. "How you…." I let out a frustrated groan as Logan looked at me with pleading eyes. _Ugh, because of that, I forgot that what I was so mad at him about._

_It wasn't until it was almost 5 that Katie realized that she had to get going. Katie sighed, hating the fact that she didn't really want to leave, and stood up, gathering her things off of the coffee table. "Is it five already?" Logan asked as he looked at his watch. "Whoa, I didn't realize that time went by so fast."_

_"Me neither." Katie agreed, brushing her hair behind her ears. "I had fun." _

_Logan smiled over at her, his arm behind her on the back of the couch. "Me too." He agreed and brushed her hair out of her face, lightly cupping her cheek._

_"Could…" Katie's heart leapt into her throat. She could hear it beating really hard in her ears. "Could you please not do that?"_

_"Do what?" Logan asked, with a mischievous twinkle in his eye. "This?" he moved forward and kissed her. Katie kissed him back almost immediately. The way that Logan and James kissed was different. James as more passionate and hungry, which she had to admit she liked, and Logan was more soft and sweet, which she liked as well._

_'__Logan's a good kisser__' Katie thought to herself as she gently placed her hands on Logan's chest. '__I wonder if he kissed Camille the same way__' Katie questioned. As soon as that thought entered her mind, her eyes flashed open and she pushed him away and leapt to her feet. "What?" he asked as Katie leapt to her feet. "What is it?"_

_"James kissed me," Katie blurted out, before she thought of what she was going to say. She wanted to say 'James kissed me, and you kissed me, and I'm confused.' But the first part was all that she could get out. The hard expression on Logan's face didn't help matters either._

_"I know," Logan replied quietly._

_"You know?" Katie repeated, now even more confused. Her heart was still beating really fast, her cheeks were still flushed. "How do you know?" She frowned. "Did Kendall or James tell you?"_

_"No," Logan replied calmly, looking up at her from where he was still sitting on the couch. "I…uh, I saw you."_

_"You saw us?" Katie repeated again._

_"Yeah," Logan licked his lips. "I was there…at the restaurant that you guys were at." He scratched the back of his neck. "And…I kind of followed you guys back to the campus. But I didn't follow you on the date," Logan explained quickly when he saw Katie starting to glare. "Like, I didn't know that you were on a date with him until you were leaving. I was going to join you, but I thought that something else was going on, so I hung back."_

_"And then you followed us." Katie nodded, suddenly feeling hurt and betrayed. "Why?" Logan opened and closed his mouth for a few seconds and then stayed silent, looking away. Katie shook her head. "Never mind." She walked over to the closet and grabbed her coat before heading towards the door._

_"Katie, wait!" Logan called after her._

_But he got a slamming door in reply._

"The only reason that I followed you guys was because I was jealous." Logan admitted after I hadn't said anything for a few moments. Startled, I looked up at him. "I was jealous of all of the time that you were spending with James and I was jealous that you guys were having such a great relationship when mine and Camille's had fallen apart."

"But, you didn't-"Once again, Logan cut me off.

"I know, I didn't have the right to follow you," Logan replied quickly, easily voicing my thoughts. That was something that annoyed me and flattered me at the same time. That Logan understood me well enough that he knew what I was thinking or what I was going to say before I even had a chance to say it. "And at first I thought that the only reason that I was attracted to you was because I was missing Camille so much." He licked his lips. "But now I know that that's not the reason."

"Then what is?" I whispered, feeling mystified from everything that he was telling me.

"Because you're everything that I'm not." Logan replied heatedly. "You're willing to take risks and I just sit around doing what I'm supposed to do. You're a breath of fresh air and I really needed that." He moved forward and placed his hands on my hips. "You're, like, my complete opposite, Katie Knight, but it works."

I couldn't help but let a smile slid onto my face. "You're such a poet, Logan Mitchell."

"Well, I have to have something to do other than study." Logan replied and smiled shyly. "And I hope that you can help me with that." He slowly started to move towards me.

"I _may _have to pencil you in." I replied and closed my eyes, closing the gap between us and kissing him.

**THE END**

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A/N: Total fail, I just realized that in the story I went from doing it all in first person to third person. I had only noticed. I hope you guys liked the alternate ending. Now the story is officially over.**

**Cheers,**

**-Riley**


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